Pendulum
by KoogooHyooga
Summary: Re-uploaded with shorter chapters. We all know what happened over one hundred years ago when Aizen began his experiments on innocent people and Soul Reapers. But what would have happened if Aizen dragged another innocent soul into his plans and took thing further than first intended? How will the plot change from one girl's existence? OC's.
1. Invasion

We all know what happened over one hundred years ago in the Seireitei, when the Aizen began his experiments on innocent people, soul reapers and captains. But what would have happened if Aizen had unintentionally dragged another innocent and unsuspecting soul into his plans and took them a bit further than first intended? How would the plot change just from one little girl's existence and spurr of the moment involvement?

OC as main character, Follows original storyline on most aspects but with tons of changes, Rating M for some bad language, violence and Minor suggestive themes (Maybe later on in the story), Using terms from English version. Spiritual pressure instead of Reiatsu and etc.

No lemons!

This is my first fanfiction so sorry if there's many mistakes or it's bad or boring etc, I've already been told countless times how crappy my writing by teachers but i somehow still got an A and B in my English exams o.0

I like writing this, it's like an escape for me so I'll carry on for my own enjoyment if no one likes it :)

Also this only had about 4 chapters but i decided that they were far too long and reuploaded them into short chaptered. What was chapter 4 is now chapter 8, the amount exactly double incase you can;t find where you left off... not that anyone will ever enjoy this enough to read that far... :?

Keep in mind that these events are parallel to the real events of the anime/manga,try and match them up and relate them with the dates that I give. :)

I do not own bleach, Tite Kubo does. Though I take credit for my OC's and my ideas, Enjoy and Review ^^

**Bold** +_ Italic_ = _**Thoughts.**_

* * *

It was that awkward moment again, the one that happens at least once in every teenager's school life. That moment when you are so far away in your own little world and are so rudely bought back to reality by a teacher. Inconsiderate fools.

This was happening quite a lot recently and she was getting a bit of a rebel reputation for it, but not like she cared. Reputations meant nothing to her. She had been sitting next to the window about half way along the classroom, with her pencil hanging in her mouth dumbly, hand on her chin, her unblinking gaze fixed on across the academy grounds, completely oblivious to the world around her. That is until a heavy book slammed down on her desk and almost made her fall off her chair in fright.

"Murasaki! Will you please pay attention, I'm sick of you not listening and having to repeat myself" their history teacher bellowed down at her. Her heart still pounding violently against her ribs, she stared up at the teacher paused for a moment and then pretended to faint, slamming her head down on the desk with her tongue lolling out. Of course the rest of the class found this highly amusing but the teacher wasn't the least bit impressed.

She looked up after a few moments, her eyes forming that signature glare."And you think scaring the living daylights out of me is gonna help?" she retaliated, looking up at her livid teacher.

"Maybe it will scare some sense into you!"

She sighed deeply and rolled her eyes, knowing this argument could last for the rest of the period, but she couldn't be bothered to continue it today. "Yeah all right all right, can you just repeat the question please?"

The teacher raised an eyebrow. This girl was usually argumentative, Was this a sudden improvement on her bad attitude? The teacher decided to not question the change and repeated the question anyway. "What is the most powerful flame type Zanpakuto known to the Soul society to this day?"

"What the-" the girl began, about to question the question. The teacher winced, as though being stabbed by the words, and changed his mind the instant the girl opened her mouth to answer. _**She's still argumentative, I guess that's punishment for getting my hopes up.**_ "Why are you asking such obvious questions... a five-year old would kno-" she cut off when noticing his expression and decided to just answer and get the teacher off her back. "Never mind. The answer is Ryujin Jakka, Owned by Yamamoto Genryuusei, the founder of the academy and leader of the 13 court guard squads." she recited, knowing this simple information off by heart, but she might as well redeem herself by giving a good answer.

"Good. That wasn't difficult, was it?" the teacher asked sarcastically, walking away back to the front of the class, reading aloud from his text-book as he went.

She sighed again and took to doodling in the margins or her text-book for the rest of her lesson until the bell rang for dinnertime. She caught a few sideways glances from some of her class mates staring at her or giggling occasionally, shooting back her famous signiture death glares which silenced each one of them.

Once the bell rang she was one of the first people to leave the room, practically leaping over tables towards the door. A short way down the corridor one of her friends, or rather rivals as she considered him, caught up with her. A Tall boy with scarlet red hair up in a spiky pony tail.

"Heeyy!" he called for her and she slowed down not turning to look at him. She knew what was coming. "How the hell do you manage it? How do you always cause more trouble than everyone else huh?" he snickered putting a hand on her shoulder.

"Shut it Renji, I don't do it intentionally you know, it just-"

"Just happens?" he finished her sentence for her. "Maaaann that's talent at its finest right there, too awesome." he laughed smacking her roughly on the shoulder.

"Har Har, very funny." she replied rolling her eyes again as they walked, still not looking at the boy. For one: he was at least two foot taller than her, and she didn't enjoy craning her neck to look at him, which was the source of many of their play fights and disagreements, and for two: she just wasn't in the mood today.

There was a call from behind them as some of Renji's guy friends called for him to join them. She finally turned to look at him.

"Uh, right, be right there guys. What you gonna do for dinner?" he asked her. She shrugged.

"I think I'll go chill under my tree in the grounds again."

"So now you own a tree?"

"Shut it. Don't even go there" she winced in annoyance.

"Alright alright" he turned away from her and stopping, pulling a thinking face for a second. It seemed as though he was thinking of saying something else and seemed to change his mind. "I'll see ya in next lesson then?"

"Yeah. See ya next lesson" she gave him a small, slightly forced smiled and carried on to her destination.

She soon came to rest under the shade of a large Sakura tree in the grounds of the Academy, her favourite spot for various reasons. She set her bag down beside her and lay down with her arms behind her head, staring at the sky and drifting into another daydream almost instantly. This time she thought not of her wildest dreams, fantasies and weird stuff, but of the past, her most reliable remaining memories.

* * *

_**The pendulum ticks back to **__**110**__** years into the past, where this all began.**_

It was a cool spring night in the Seireitei where Yamamoto Genryuusei sat in this office, a mountainous pile of paperwork perched on the desk in front of him, tottering tediously from side to side as though the faintest gust would send it toppling across the room.

Yamamoto did not like nor dislike reading through the reports of his thirteen squad captains, but when his _dearest_ Lieutenant Sasakibe wandered into his office carrying a pile of agonising boredem, such as this monstrosity, his heart sank.

_**These papers are extremely high priority, the sooner I read them the better**__ t_he old man urged himself. He leaned forwards in his chair ever so slightly and slowly reached a wrinkled hand towards the top few papers. "No... sudden... movements..." he mumbled as if the vibration of his words in the air may send the pile flying.

As if karma was out to spite him, the towering wooden doors to his office came crashing open and young man with short and messy mousey blonde hair wearing a Captain's Haori came to kneel in front of Yamamoto's desk, completely oblivious to the rain of paper falling from the ceiling.

Yamamoto held his face in his palm, despairing. _**Why did I hire this buffoon? His stupidity never ceases to **__**amaze me. It will take forever and a day to reassemble these papers in the correct order **_he thought, again regretting hiring the man all those years ago due to his clumsiness.

"Captain commander-" the man began to pant, out of breath and red in the face from running. Yamamoto cut him off before he could continue.

"Were you born in a barn, Captain Urahara?" he asked sarcastically.

"N-no sir... I was-"

"Then learn to knock before entering and close the door behind you. And collect these documents off my floor this instant." He snapped.

"My apologies Captain, but I've come to report that the Department for Research and Development have detected a massive amount of Spiritual Pressure approaching the World of the Living, It's like that of a hollow's but multiple one hundredfold!"

This caught Yamamoto's attention and he stood up, momentarily ignoring the sea of paper. "You are sure of this, Urahara?"

"One hundred percent Sir, the spiritual pressure readings are off the scales"

"And the location?"

"Karakura Town, in the West of Tokyo, Japan."

Yamamoto lifted one fluffy eyebrow in surprise. A small black butterfly appeared from thin air and floated down to rest on Yamamoto's index finger. He spoke to it.

Every Soul reaper in the Seireitei did as instructed and stopped their current action to listen to the wizened voice emitting from the air around them, as though through a giant invisible megaphone.

"Attention. An immense spiritual pressure is approaching the human world. Squads 2, 5 and 9 are to be dispatched to Karakura Town to access and handle the situation. All other squads, with no exceptions, are to remain on standby and patrol the Seireitei. Any suspicious activity must be reported and dealt with immediately. I will not allow these attacks and disappearances to continue."

Once finished, the Hell Butterfly fluttered off his finger and out of the nearest window.

"Captain Urahara, Go back to Squad 12 labs, access the situation and keep us updated, any changes must be reported"

"Sir, I would like to join Captain Yoruichi of squad 2, they are lacking squad members due to the recent attacks, they need back up.. I will have my Lieutenant and seated members taking care of Squad 12's duties back at the labs, they are fully capable of the job"

Yamamoto paused to think for a moment. "...Very well. Any negligence or mistakes made will be on your head, Urahara. I'm counting on you"

The young man blushed a violent shade of plum, bowed and scrambled from the room.

Yamamoto strolled across his office to stare out across the Seireitei. It was half way through the night and for miles hundreds of tiny lights could be seen igniting, voices could be heard in the rooms and streets below. _**What on earth could be happening now? As if the recent attacks on residents of the Rukongai weren't enough, now the World of the Living too?**_

But Yamamoto would not let his guard down. An attack in the middle of the night was surely done to throw them off guard, unless this anomaly was a coincidence. _**No, it couldn't be a coincidence, the timing was too perfect**__ he thought. _Even if this had nothing to do with the Soul Society's recent troubles he wasn't going to take any chances.

He took a deep breath and resumed his seat behind his desk, staring at the waves of paperwork as if to make them clean up and reorganise themselves.

* * *

A while later

A group had congregated at the main senkaimon of the Seireitei, waiting to be dispatched to the Living World. Captain Urahara rushed towards the impatient, groggy looking bunch. "Sorry I'm so late, had to lay out firm instructions to my squad" he explained, waving a hand apologetically.

"What is this about Urahara?" A man with a pointed face and long straight blonde hair, also wearing a white haori, asked sounding annoyed and yawning boredly. "You disturbed my beauty sleep."

"You know as much as I do, Captain Hirako. Let's head out and maybe we can answer your question" he said, gesturing towards the large gate as it opened to reveal a shining white light.

They entered the light without hesitation. The small group of ten people, four captains and three lieutenants and three third seats rushed through the precipice world. The walls which usually moved and undulated like the stomach of some sort of creature stayed still as they passed, nonetheless they remained in a closely knit group.

Once the light at the end of the tunnel appeared, they jumped out of it, the wooden doors sliding shut behind them. They had entered a place that seemed to be the outskirts of a town. A wide river ran below them, with pedestrian paths and grass verges leading up to a football pitch on one side of the river. On the opposite side of the river was the edge of either a very large town or small city, with residential areas close to them and larger buildings in the distance.

The group of Soul Reapers stood and observed the scene for a moment. Another man with short white hair wearing a captain's Haori spoke first, evidently annoyed. "Well, Urahara? I don't sence any strange spiritual pressures. So, were you wrong or were you pulling some stupid prank on us?"

"On the contrary, Captain Muguruma" Urahara's face was completely blank of expression as he pointed to the sky. A dark cloud was forming far above the town, like a monstrous storm. The Soul Reapers turned to the direction he was pointing and looked on in horror.

"What is that thing?" A girl with short midnight blue hair asked her captain in fear.

The sky suddenly began to quake, a rip appeared with began to open like a mouth being unzipped. "A Garganta, Sui Feng." Yoruichi answered, stepping forward in front of her student. "The exit, or entrance, from Hueco Mundo into the World of the Living."

The lieutenants took a step back as their superiors clutched their Zanpakuto's and prepared to fight. Out of the Garganta stepped a monstrously tall black figure with a white pointed mask-like face, followed by what looked like millions of smaller hollows.

Out of the entire group, only one person wasn't bothered by these monsters. A young man with short curly brown hair stood behind Captain Hirako, the corner of his mouth twitching into what could have been the beginnings of a smile for a split second.

"I'll take care of these guys" Captain Mugurama shouted, taking out his sword "Blow it away, Tachikaze" currents of air began spiral around him and the sword and it turned into a small knife.

"Wait Kensei-" Hirako took a step forward but Kensei shot off in the direction of the hollows. "What a fool, he can't take this many hollows and menos alone" he sighed unsheathing his own Zanpakuto and following after Kensei, "Lets go Sosuke." The brown-haired man nodded and followed Hirako.

Urahara and the other captains and lieutenants watched as more and more hollows escaped from the Garganta.

"We must stop this, we cannot allow these hollows to escape into the City, it will be chaos to destroy them all. Yoruichi, Sui Feng, can you two help me catch those hollows that pass us?" the two nodded. "Good, then i want the rest of you to help Captain Hirako and Captain Muguruma destroy the hollows at the Garganta and close it, understood?" he said, turning to the remaining Soul Reapers who all agreed and shot off to help.

Kensei was already up at the Garganta, Slashing through the Menos with ease, Hirako helping him and catching a few of the hollows that tried to pass them too. One of the menos drew back and opened its mouth, forming a sphere of red energy. "Kensei! look out!" a girl with green hair and a pink scarf shouted. Knowing he wouldn't move in time she dived down with both her legs straight. "Mashiiiiroooo DROP KICK!" and hit in square in the back, sending him flying.

Kensei spluttered and regained his balance just as a beam of red light ripped past them, leaving a sort of sonic boom in its wake. He rubbed his back, for once he was thankful of Mashiro's amazing athletic ability. "Thanks a lot, it hurt but i'd rather have back pain than be dead" she giggled and backflipped out of the way of a bat-like hollow, upper cutting in the chin it with her foot.

The streams of hollows leaving the garganta seemed endless, and the Soul Reapers were getting tired, fast. "Third seats! Do not let the hollows pass by! Do not allow them into the city! Kensei, At this rate we'll be needing back up" Hirako said, moving back to back with Kensei to catch his breath after slicing a menos in half.

"Your right.. there's.. too many.. of them" he panted too.

* * *

In a dark alley way in the suburbs of West Karakura, a spirit girl hid behind a row of trash cans sobbing but trying not to make any noise.

_**Whats going on? What are hell are those things? **_She thought frantically. She felt that unexplainable feeling that forcefully washed over her when one of those creatures were near and shrank as far into the shadow as she could, though her new pearly white body didn't help the situation in the slightest, she felt more noticable like this.

It came down the alley way, in the form of a monstrous Komodo dragon lizard with a skull-like white mask. It's snake-like forked tongue rattled as it sniffed along the alley way, trying to find its target. The spirit girl sucked in her gut, hoping foolishly that it would help her be less noticable, but the hollow stopped dead right next to her. It gave off a putrid stench and a howling cry then turned it's head to the her.

She instantly rolled sideways, not giving it another chance to try to eat her and ran as fast her legs would carry her down the alley, the little chain attached to her chest clanging from side to side. The monster scurried after her, roaring again and swiping at her. She took a sharp left turn down another alley trying to throw it off and confuse it but instead it just plowed through a wall and around the corner like the wall had been made of jelly.

She gasped in shock and carried on running, transparent tears torrenting down her face more than ever. _**This is the end, I can't keep this up for much longer. **_She turned her head to the right and saw the main road in front of the Karasu river. She didn't stop but carried on running down the road, hoping against hope that she would find someone who could help her. Suddenly the hollow that had been chasing her launched over her head and landed in front of her as though it had fallen from the sky. She grinded to a halt and span around to run the other way, but another hollow in the form of an eagle landed in front of her that side too.

She was cornered. It was really the end. _**I'm sorry.. I never got chance to say sorry to you.. Forgive me..**_she thought. She crumpled to her knees, holding her head in her hands waiting to be slaughtered.

* * *

Overhead Urahara, Yoruichi and Sui Feng were running across the rooftop's, search for hollows and defeating any they came into contact with. Sui Feng took the back of the group, she slashed through a hollow that had landed behind her mercilessly and spotted two more on the road below. "Captain, down there!" She yelled, making Urahara and Yoruichi stop and change direction, pointing over to the two hollows cornering a spirit. They shot down to the floor with lightning speed flash steps and came to stop before the hollows.

Urahara held his Zanpukto above his head and forcefully stopped the clawed hand that had swooped down to the spirit girl, Sui Feng did the same with the other hollow but completely sliced off it's talon. It gave a huge painful screech and the spirit girl looked up.

"I'm... I'm alive!" she cheered.

"Well, not exactl-" Urahara began to chuckle.

"Kisuke!" Sui Feng yelled "Now is not the time for that!"

"Right, Yoruichi!" he called. The girl stared around at them, completely confused by what was now happening. Yoruichi appeared next to the girl startling her more than she already was. She smiled reassuringly and held a hand out to the spirit, helping her up and moving her away from the fray.

"What are those things?" she asked as she and Yoruichi stopped at the corner of a building a few blocks away. She looked around to see the girl and man who had saved her following close behind with more of those... things.

"Theres no time to explain, but let's say you'd be in trouble if we didn't find you when we did" Yoruichi smiled. Urahara dived round the corner to stand next to them as Sui Feng distracted the approaching hollows.

"Now, little girl-" he began but was cut off.

"I'm not little, I'll have you know I'm sixteen years old!"

"Yeah yeah, ok, now kid, sorry to spring this on you, but its dangerous here and you need to move on-" Urahara said holding the hilt of his sword backwards. The end of it glowed bright blue and he moved it towards her forehead.

"Whoaa, don't come near me with that thing" she said leaning side ways to avoid it.

"For god sake Kisuke-" Sui Feng cursed, her tone harsh, getting impatient as she continued to fend off more hollows.

"I know, I know, Look I'm going to help you move on to the next life by giving you a Soul Burial, you can rest in peace"

Her eyes widened in horror "No! Please! I'm not ready to go yet! I need to say sorry-" she stopped with a gasp as a huge beam of red light ripped across the sky above them, causing an explosion in the distance.

"I don't have time for this, It's too dangerous here right now, if it was any other time I would help, but I can't. Good luck kid, you'll be needing it." And without waiting for her to answer he planted the hilt of his Zanpakuto on her forehead and watched her vaporise into tiny wisps of blue smoke and butterflies. He sighed and sheathed his zanpakuto once she had disappeared.

"Good grief, I'd have to strangle that kid if I knew her, so annoying" Sui Feng protested. A hollow that had been charging towards them suddenly stopped dead and turned in the opposite direction. She frowned, not understanding why it had suddenly changed course, but she still didn't sheath her zanpakuto "Thats... odd"

"I don't know Sui Feng, if I knew her I think I'd like her, I liked her attitude. That girl had guts." Yoruichi contradicted, ignoring the retreating hollow.

"Y-yes ma'am but-" she began to stutter, giving in to her master as always but Urahara interrupted.

"The hollows seem to be attracted to these spirits, so if we want to get rid of the stray hollows all we have to do is find spirits and the hollows will come to us. We've got a lot of work to do so let's get moving" The women nodded their agreement and they flash stepped away from their spot.

One by one, they found lost spirits. For a while they would walk around with the spirit, using them as bait to attract all the hollows in their current area in large groups, helping to defeat large amounts of hollows at once. Once they stopped pursuing the spirit they performed Soul Burial's on them and helped them move on to the Soul Society. The city was so vast that it took quite a while with this method, but it was effective in the long run.

Eventually less and less hollow came out of the Garganta making it easy for Kensei's team to eradicate them before they made it to the city, leaving it to Urahara's team to get rid of the ones skulking around Karakura.

It took a huge effort to force the garganta to close, but they did it eventually. All ten of them scoured the city for stray spirits and hollows, just to clean up after themselves and then gathered at a spot near where they had entered by the river.

"A job well done I'd say." Hirako smirked wiping a scratch that was dripping of blood on his cheek. "Put your face straight Sosuke, you did well. Stop being such a grouch." he added, noticing the expression on his Lieutenant's face.

"Yes, Captain." he replied simply. "Lack of sleep, Sir."

"Ok, time to go back home. I'll report to the commander, not sure if he wants us to stay on alert or go back to bed though" Urahara laughed at Sosuke and Mashiro's tired expressions. He opened up a Senkaimon and entered, yawning as the others followed suit the wooden doors sliding shut and vanishing behind them.

* * *

And there is chapter one ^^

I hope you liked it, so please leave a review with suggestions, especially if you find spelling and grammar mistakes. I have a really bad habit of repeating words and using random capital letters subconsciously.

As the story is based on time, I'll probably be using quiet a lot of time skips, and moving forward and backward in time like i did here. You'll get a proper introduction to our Main character/OC in the next chapter.

Also i decided to make the Academy more like a normal school, and not how it is shown in the anime with large classrooms. I'm making the classrooms normal size like in Karakura high.

Ty to my dearest CyanSparke for proof reading and etc.

Eventually this story will be the Prequel, or sister story to CyanSparke's "Gifted Strength, Malignant Intent", but it can be read before or after Cyan's story. I'll explain more later on :)


	2. A Warm Welcome

I'v decided to reupload these later chapters and make them shorter, as it seems that people don't like long chapters especially when its about OC's.

The fact is that I can't just jump into the action without having explained how my OC actually got to that point. I couldn't just make her die, become a spirit and become an overpowered shinigami all in one chapter.

It takes slow development and the characters history plays an important part later on... The best OC's are ones who's history and personality you can relate to.

Yes she will go into the whole main story line, she will meet all of the main and supporting characters, she will help with rescuing Rukia and there will be an arancar arc but it all takes time and patience..

The past arc is concentrating on what like if i like for a spirit and the beckground of how a shinigami becomes a shinigami and their personal history and the story in general is about the past, how things happened and how things changed. It wouldn't be a story without the history.

So now I'm making the chapters shorter and easier to read so people are less likely to get bored, although it's probably just a boring story rather than being too long.

Rant over, that is all.

I don;t own bleach. I wish i did. I do own Kimiko, her family, her history and any other OCs that may pop up :)

* * *

Chapter 2 – A Warm Welcome

A light breeze swept over the girl as she slept, sending shivers down her spine. She opened her eyes slowly, attempting to focus on her surroundings just as a blossom petal floated onto her cheek.

She had thought she was outside for a moment until, as her eyes adjusted, she realised she was looking out of an open door. She scanned the room she was in, a traditional Japanese bedroom, the walls a pale mint green and the floor mahogany brown, with open sliding doors that led out onto an outside hallway and into the back yard. Her room was empty apart from the white futon she was lying in, positioned in the middle of the room and small floor desk in the far corner.

She pulled herself up feeling light headed even though she had got up slowly, gave up and plopped her head back on the big puffy pillow.

It seemed like no one was around at the moment but getting out of bed to explore seemed like too much of an effort for now, so despite being completely confused as to where she was and why, she stayed put, watching the petals of the Sakura tree fluttering in the spring breeze outside of her door.

She soon faded into a daydream, thinking how this was probably a very vivid dream itself, but soon snapped out of it as she heard slow foot steps down the outside corridor. She panicked, stuck between the decisions of feigning sleep and demanding to know where she was, but before she could decide a woman wearing a Magenta Kimono walked past her door carrying a tray of tea and sweets. She peered into the room while still walking, then did a double take when she realised the girl was now awake.

"Ah, you finally came round did you?" she asked, walking into the room.

The girl shuffled backwards away from the woman like a frightened animal. "Hey, hey calm down, i'm not going to hurt you" she said looking concerned and slowly set the tray down on the floor as she knelt down next to the futon. "How do you feel? Would you like something to eat or drink? I can fix you up a meal if you like?" she asked cheerily.

"I'm…" she began to answer, not really knowing what she felt like or whether she had an appetite yet. She felt disorientated and lost. "I don't know… I feel weird…" she groaned, still looking around. "Where am I exactly?"

"This is Harumachi of the second district" she began, but she seemed to have second thoughts. "In fact I'll call my Husband, he can explain these sort of things better than me" she handed the girl some green tea and got up to leave the room. "Please try to drink that, you might feel better" she smiled and left.

She sat up again, this time not feeling light headed, and pulled her futon closer to the door. She sat cross legged staring out over the large and peaceful tranquility garden, sipping at her tea occasionally. "Harumachi... Second District..." she repeated under her breath, not recognising the name at all. She was still totally confused but seeing how pleasent the woman had been made her feel a little less anxious.

It took no more than five minutes for the woman to return with a man. He too was tall, middle aged, with the same black hair as his wife but chin length and messy. He was slightly more rounded and full faced compared to the woman's slim and sculpted features, and he wore a royal blue kimono. They both kneeled besides her and began their explanation.

"Thank you for the tea, You were right I do feel a little better" she smiled weakly, setting her now empty cup on the tray besides her.

"Good to hear. I am Shinsetsu Murasaki, and this is my wife Yoshino Murasaki, I am the leader of Harumachi village of district two. What is your name?"

She paused for a moment. _**Good question, **__**What is my name? **_"I'm… Ki... Ki…." She struggled, trying to piece together the syllables of her first name. "Kimiko... I think… I don't remember my surname at all" she mumbled, rubbing her head as if that would jump start her brain.

"Figures. Sometimes people wake up with no memory if they've had a traumatic experience. It will probably come back to you one day" he pondered thoughtfully.

"What will?"

"You don't know?"

"Of course she doesn't know Shin, how do you expect her to know when shes only just arrived here, she's not psychic." Yoshino hissed.

"Huh? Know what? Why am I here?"

"Kimiko, this is the Soul Society. Yoshino found you unconcious wearing these plain white robes" he gestured to what Kimiko was wearing "That means that you died in the world of the living and came here to begin your next life, the soul society is what we once called the 'Afterlife'" his wife shot him a warning look.

"Shin, you can't just spring it on the poor girl like that"

"Good Grief woman! She needs to know, what was i suposed to say-" Kimiko interupted their squabling with her own thoughts.

"So i _did_ die then..." she mumbled aloud. She closed her eyes and vauguely remembered things, like a film playing behind her eyes, quick snapshots that didn't really mean anything to her. She saw herself with a pearly white and transparent body, a chain in her chest, a monster and some people whose faces were blurred. The film shot past so fast that she couldn't make any sense of it.. But before she knew it she was snapping back to reality again.

"Kimiko?" Shinsetsu asked, shaking her gently by the shoulder snapping her out of her thoughts. "Don't stress yourself out about it, the more you relax the more likely it is that your memory will return. It's not unheard of for people to suffer with amnezia, If you stress youself out you'll only make yourself sick" He explained matter of factly.

Kimiko nodded. She was already worried and felt nausious, she had died for god sake. Thats not a piece of information you can learn and let pass in an instant. Dying had been a big shock to her, but she could barely remember anything, and the flashes of part's she could remember were unpleasant, so she did not yet know if she even wanted to remember. She had no idea what her life had been like or how she had died, and she was afraid that the truth may be gorey and hard to stomach. She ignored the butterflies fluttering around in her stomach for now. "So how did i end up here exactly?"

"Like Shin said, I found you." Yoshino smiled. "Myself and a neighbour found you out in the forest while we were picking fruit a couple of days ago, You're lucky we found you when we did"

"I'm lucky? I've been asleep for days? What the-"

"You see theres been a lot of-" Shinsetsu discreatly elbowed Yoshino making her stutter and change course. "Of Illness! So many people getting sick recently. If you'd have been left there any longer who knows what could have happened"

"Would I have died again if i'd have gotten sick?" Kimiko asked, curiousity getting the better of her.

Shinsetsu chuckled and looked at his wife. Kimiko didn't like that look. "We'll leave that story for another time. There are much more important things for you to learn here. For example, It is customary for a new arrival to live with the people who found and looked after them, like an adopted family. Would you like to stay with us here?"

Kimiko thought about it for a second. This family seemed nice, friendly, safe, caring... they couldn't be bad people and she had nowhere else to go, but she couldn't help but feel like they were keeping something from her. "Right, well I'm grateful for you taking care of me so I will accept and live with you if its not too much trouble" she smiled weakly again.

Shinsetsu beamed. "Thats wonderful. No trouble at all, We promise to take good care of you. Now you should get some rest before dinner. Yoshino would you mind preparing Kimiko some clothes? We can't have her walking around in these white robes forever." he said in one breath, visibly delighted with her decision. He stood up to leave muttering something about how his daughter would react. Yoshino too left, sliding the door closed behind her and continued down the corridor she had been going to before she had spotted Kimiko.

Kimiko lay there for a while thinking, but eventually drifted off to sleep again.

Kimiko was woken by Yoshino later that night for dinner, which turned out to be quite the special occasion for the family. She noticed that it was already dark outside and the garden outside of her room was now lit up by various lanterns, containing fire, not electricity.

"When your finished changing come to the dining room. Come out of your room, straight across the garden into the front courtyard, turn left into the main building, turn right along the first hallway and its the first door on the left, we'll be waiting for you." Yoshino told her, pointing out directions to her as she spoke. Kimiko nodded and started to change.

Yoshino had chosen a Kimono to suit Kimiko's features. Dark purple a few shade lighter than her hair with Ice blue embroidered patterns to match her eyes. She checked herself in the mirror before heading to the said room.

She resighted the directions to herself as she walked, feeling nice and toasty in her Kimono as spring nights were often quite chilly.

When she finally arrived she was welcomed by cheering and a delightful concoction of smells as she entered. Shinsetsu, Yoshino, a girl who looked around Kimiko's age and an elderly woman sat at the table piled high with food.

"Here she is, star of the show, welcome dear!" Shinsetsu cheered from the end of the table waving at her and still beaming.

"Wow..." she mouthed as she stared at the table, speechless, saliva leaking from her open mouth.

"Welcome, come on in and take a seat" Shinsetsu beamed again as she chose a seat next to the young girl.

"It is someones birthday?" Kimiko asked, pleasently suprised by this family party.

"I guess you could call it a birthday, Today is the day you joined us." Shinsetsu agreed. "Welcome to the family, Kimiko. Enjoy the meal" he said raising a glass of ruby liquid. The other three raised their glasses too, the girl looking unimpressed at her pitiful glass of juice, compared to her parents' wine.

"This is all for me? Really there was no need-"

"Nonsense. We like to celebrate and make you feel welcome. It's very rare that a young and beautiful girl like you joins our village, It's rare for new people at all, It's a time to celebrate" he said, his cheeks slightly rosey.

"I guess i can't argue with that" she giggled, not hesitating to dig into the rice.

The young girl next to Kimi was indeed Yoshino and Shinsetsu's only daughter, Yuuga Murasaki. The elderly woman was Yoshino's mother and Yuuga's grandmother.

The conversation was instantly based on her, asking her if she remembered anything besides her own name. Now she thought about it, the smell of the food had made her realise her apetite. As she ate various things she realised, or rather remembered what she liked and disliked, she automatically knew that she would enjoy the ramen, but wasn't so keen on the Takoyaki, squid was too chewy and rubbery for her. She didn't really think much of it but was kind of glad to have a memory, or feeling, even if it was only something insignificant like food preferences. They seemed to notice her far away expression and asked what was wrong, so she explained it.

"Don't worry, things will come back to you quickly" said Yoshino's mother, Chie Murasaki, after she had stopped chuckling. "Even food is a good start. If you cannot remember everything, then think of this a fresh start, A second chance or a new life."

"I never thought of it like that, but i guess that is a good point" Kimiko admitted.

"There are numerous paths you could take, so many different results, but currently you can forget about your past, and not seek the answers you want, or be patient and remember everything in due time. Do what you feel is best for you but do not dwell on it. Dwelling on it and forcing yourself to remember will get you no where." The aged woman lectured. Kimiko blinked in suprise, not expecting a lecture but this woman seemed to know what she was talking about. She realised that the others fell into silence while Chie had been speaking, she couldn't help but think that this was something the Murasaki's were used to.

"Thank you Chie, I'll think about it" she nodded and went for second helpings of the Ramen.

Yuuga seemed to be excited by Kimiko's arrival, she was extremely talkative, and eating faster than she could swallow. She coughed while attempting to ask Kimiko a question and slurp noodles at the same time.

"Yuu, table manners" Yoshino reminded her sturnly and she gulped down her noodles with a drink of Juice and continued.

"Sorry Mom. Kimiko, would you like to come out into the village with me tomorrow to help run a few errands? maybe i'll show you around too" Yuu asked enthusiastically, her beaming smile not faultering even once.

"Sure, sounds good. I can't stay in my room for the rest of my life can I?"

"Fresh air will do you some good, the villagers will be so excited to meet you, I should imagine that the majority of them know you are here already" Yoshino pitched in, helping herself to a fruit salad.

Kimi raised an eyebrow. This couldn't be good news. "How could they know about me so quickly?"

"Our neighbour who found you with mother was super excited and she likes to gossip, she'll have made sure everyone knows you before the midnight that you arrived for sure" Yuuga giggled, dipping her Dango's into dark chocolate sauce.

"Greeaaaaaatt" Kimiko sighed. "This should be fun"

"Naaahhh, it won't be that bad I promise. You might get a few stares but nothing more, Honest."

After the meal Kimiko headed for bed again. Feeling pleasantly full and content. She had thanked them all multiple times for their hospitality and headed back across the courtyard and back into her small and empty bedroom.

She was tired and couldn't be bothered to go searching for pyjama's to sleep in, so she changed back into her plain white robes and fell asleep within minutes.


	3. Shield

I don;t know bleach :(

And finally, Kimi finds that she has a strange ability :)

* * *

Chapter 3 

Kimi was woken next morning by a loud bang and blinding light hitting her eyes. "Kiiiimikooo, Riiiise and Shineeee" Yuuga sang, standing in the door way in her pyjama's, laughing at Kimi's vampire-ish reaction to the sunlight.

"Ugghh.. What time is it?" she groaned, still half asleep.

"About eight o'clock. You know what they say, the early bird gets the worm!" She beamed again, her grin almost as bright as the sun. "I'll be waiting for you in the front courtyard, meet me there when you're dressed and cleaned up" she turned to leave and close the door behind her.

Kimi continued staring at the door for a moment, then let her head drop back onto her pillow, rubbing her eyes and seeing the colourful after images of the light. She gave herself a few minutes to let her eyes adjust, then got up.

She slid open a door to her left, which she had correctly guessed to be the closet, entered and looked around for a moment. A few items of clothing hang up in a high rail above her. She chose a short, knee length violet yukata with a pale pink Sakura flower embroidered on the back just beneath the neck.

The room to the left of the closet was again an accurate guess, her own little bathroom. Very small, quite cramped, but more than enough for Kimiko. As long as she had running water and some clean clothes she was happy.

After fixing her messy bed-hair into a high and tight pony tail on the top of her head and putting her clothes on, she glanced in the long mirror on the wall. She didn't look half as rough as she thought she might. She had small bags under her eyes but those would disappear after she got more sleep.

She messed up her hair a little bit. It was down to her collar bone in length but had many layers, so when tied up it spiked out at the top of the pony tail then fell down, some strands were not long enough to even reach the back of her head falling and so fell down, midnight purple locks framing a soft white skin, pale lips and piercingly ice blue eyes that were only a few shades away from white, all blended together perfectly.

Kimi blacked out for a moment as she tightened her hair bobble. Another film played behind her eyes as it had yesterday.

This time there were people in grey and white uniforms, girls and boys carrying brief cases, a large building. It then changed and she saw herself sitting on a patch of grass under a tree. A group of boys around her, shouting things like "Porcupine!" and "Hedge hog!" at her, as though they were jeering and taunting her. She came back to reality quickly but felt physically sick.

Staring at the mirror again she saw that her complexion was now ghostly pale. "That was... A memory?" She looked back at her hair. She had liked it's spiky effect at first, but now she was unsure.

_**My hair doesn't look bad... Why would people insult me about it... **_She thought, examining her appearance again, looking from every angle, trying to understand her vision. She bit her own lip, _**If I go out like this, what will people think of me... First impressions...**_ then shook her head. She stared in the mirror again and pulled out the hair bobble, shaking her head around to mess up her layers a little. _**No-one can complain about untied hair... they have only ever seen me like this.**_

She took a deep breath to compose herself and made her way down to the front courtyard as arranged.

On her way out she spotted Yoshino who waved good morning to her from across the hallway but let her carry on with her business, probably knowing that she and Yuuga had made arrangements and not wanting to disturb.

Yuuga was sitting on a statue in the front yard wearing a yukata similar to Kimi's but grey, with the same pale pink Sakura flower on the back, kicking her feet around and humming a tune to herself. Yuu's hair was the complete opposite of Kimi's, whose was past her shoulder in length and cut into messy and flicky layers. Hers was cut into a shoulder length, severely straight bob style with a pink ribbon tied like a headband at the top. She spotted Kimi and jumped down.

"All ready to go? Were gonna be doing a lot of walking I think"

"Sure, fine by me. I'm glad to be able to stretch my legs properly" she agreed, doing small warm up's for her legs and lower back as she spoke.

"Well firstly I'll show you around the town, I don't have a specific schedule today so if someone asks us to do a job we'll just take it, we may even get paid" she explained, bobbing her tongue out slyly as they left into the street.

Kimiko hadn't realised how large the Murasaki house was but it was more like a small mansion from the outside. Surrounded by trees and woodland, it was almost like living in a tree house village, greenery and flowers every direction you looked. It was very pleasant, the air was fresh and the breeze was the perfect temperature, even though it was her first time out of the house she felt calm and relaxed here already. She smiled to herself, actually thinking that she would enjoy her stay here now.

Yuu noticed Kimi's far away expression long before she snapped out of it.

"Oh, sorry. I often go off into daydreams, just poke me or something if I look zoned out" Kimi laughed, as Yuu told her she had been trying to explain something to her. "What were you saying?"

"Nothing really important, just talking about jobs"

"Right. Jobs." She repeated like a parrot. "What are these jobs? Are they difficult?"

"Just errands I help run around the village. The other older kids help too but I'm most well known because I'm the village leader's daughter. They like asking me to help them because they know I'm reliable and get the job done. It could be anything from helping pick fruit to helping out an elderly resident. Some fun things happen sometimes and either get paid in pocket money or sometimes they'll give me sweets or small gifts"

"Hmmm, I don't mind helping but I wouldn't want to make a mess of things, your reliable and I wouldn't want to ruin your reputation..." Kimi sighed feeling like an intruder, she didn't want to interfere on Yuuga's spotlight, it was obvious she enjoyed it.

"Don't worry about it. Sometimes the jobs can be lonely if I'm on my own, it'll be great to have some company and someone to share the rewards with" she smiled sincerely, soon entering the main town.

"If that's the case then I'll be happy to join you, but I'm sorry before hand if I mess up" Kimi bowed quickly while trying to keep up with Yuu.

"Oh stop, you'll be fine, be more confident!"

They had walked down a long straight road and which continued in a long village high street. On either side of the wide cobbled street were buildings and shops. The atmosphere was so cheerful and welcoming. Everywhere you looked there were people running market stalls and selling all sorts of beautifully handmade products and children playing in the street.

Kimi had been looking around so much that she almost lost sight of Yuuga, who was already off in the distance. She soon caught up to her and noticed that Yuu was being greeted from all directions, or at least being acknowledged in some way. Once some of the villagers had greeted Yuu their eyes drifted to Kimi, who was following close behind her. She looked like an awestruck tourist who was constantly distracted by shiny objects. She wasn't quite sure if the looks she was getting were due to being new, or acting like such a weirdo.

Their expressions varied from that of gawping idiots and raised eyebrows to kind shouts of "Welcome", but Kimi felt slightly uncomfortable with all of these eyes on her, especially with her newly formed self consciousness.

"You weren't kidding when you said they would know about me were you?" Kimi asked Yuu, fidgeting.

"Nope. Wasn't kidding. They'll get used to you and stop staring at you soon enough."

"How soon is soon?" she asked, noticing a group of young boys ogling her. She glared at them with a stare that was almost as cold as her eye colour and they instantly looked away, seeming to notice that their examination of her was too obvious. She looked away, oddly satisfied with the scared expressions on their faces, making a mental note to practise that glare more often. _**Works like a charm**_ she chuckled to herself.

Just behind her, a man called Yuu over to his shop door way, cheerfully greeting her. "Ah Yuu, good morning!" he called, Yuu walked over to him in reply, Kimi following close behind. "Mind helping me out today? I need you to collect some items for me"

"Sure no problem, just give me a list and that book you use and I'll set off" she smiled.

"That's great" he said, picking up a list from the stall table besides him. It seemed he was used to doing this and had already prepared said list and book long ago, as if it was a routine. When he looked up to give Yuu the list he noticed Kimi standing behind her uncomfortably and laughed. "Aha, so this is the girl everyone is talking about?"

"Yes, this is Kimiko, she staying with me and my family from now on so you'll be seeing more of her. Kimi this is Mr. Kusuri, our physician, he makes medicines and herbal things for the village"

Kimi smiled in acknowledgement and bowed politely. "Nice to meet you"

"Welcome Kimiko, If you and Yuu do this job for me I'll treat you so something from the bakery, that sound good?" he offered.

"Sounds great, Lets get going Yuu, I love cakes!" Kimi laughed pretending to pull Yuu away on the errand.

"My my, aren't you the energetic one" Mr. Kusuri laughed and handed his list and a book to Yuu. "Be careful girls, you know it's not safe out there these days" he added on a serious note.

"Why is it not safe-" Kimi began to ask but Yuu cut her off.

"Yeah, we'll be fine I promise, we'll be back before noon, let's go Kimi!" She rushed, grabbing Kimi's hand and pulling her away. Shortly down the road Yuu noticed her worried expression. "Look, its nothing to worry about, forget about it and enjoy yourself"

"I'll try but I can't help but worry when I feel like something is being kept from me..." Yuu ignored this and wandered over to an old woman who was waving her to come over. She again introduced Kimi to their village tailor, her daughters and apprentices and then asked if Yuu and Kimi would bring back some buckets of water from the river.

"Sure, we're heading up the river anyway, no problem" Yuu said, nodding to Kimi to accept and carry two large wooden buckets. "We'll be back in a while ok?"

"Take your time" the woman smiled and returned into her shop.

The girls continued down the long high street and out into a bright dirt path surrounded by trees, similar to the road where the Murasaki manor was situated.

"Almost at our first destination" Yuu told Kimi casually. Soon enough the trees on either side of the road became less frequent and they left the road onto a steep dirt slope, Kimi's mouth dropped.

Below her was a massive orchard and countless rows of vegetable patches, fruit trees and rice paddys. Many people were working down on the patches, carrying around bags of fruit and vegetables on their backs. Children helping their parents and playing in the fields at the far back.

"Wow, the village grows all of it's own food" Kimi goggled, watching a young boy pass them, carrying a basket of apples the size of small basketballs.

"Well where else do you expect it to come from? It doesn't fall out of the sky you know!" Yuu said howling sarcastically. Kimi face palmed. It had sounded fine in her head but it truly was a stupid statement.

"I mean, you don't buy your food from other places... Its hard to explain, I'm used to buying it..." Kimi realised this was a subconscious memory. She knew, subconsciously, that in her past life her food was bought and not grown.

"It's fine, calm down" Yuu apologised, noticing that Kimi was getting easily embarrassed and frustrated. "The village has great weather all year round. We have a good amount of rain and even more sun, so we grow the best fruit and vegetables for miles around. Also this area was specifically picked for its position. It is never over shadowed by anything so the sun is always hitting the whole area. We're quite well known for all of this." Yuu said proudly. She walked a little bit further down the road to some steps, but Kimi couldn't be bothered with steps and slid down the slope, landing roughly at the bottom and almost falling flat on her face. Luckily no-one had seen her almost face plant into the ground, so she brushed the dirt off her clothes and quickly recovered her cool. She and Yuu walked past a patch of what looked like giant eggplants and straight to a row of orange trees.

"You weren't kidding again were you? When you say you have the best fruit and veg for miles... this is like... mutated or something, its gigantic" Kimi goggled, realising that these orange trees were far taller than average.

"First we need to pick some oranges, there's some special property in the orange zest that Mr. Kusuri needs." They both looked up at the tall trees. Looking around, there was no-one here to help them retrieve the fruit.

"So... Your telling me we need to climb these monsters?" Kimi asked, raising an eyebrow. Yuu nodded with a grin spread across her face, Seemingly completely intent on keep her feet firmly on the ground.

Kimi gulped. "Right, here goes nothing then." she rolled up her sleeves and put one foot on the tree, wiggling it around slightly into a suitable position so that her foot wouldn't slip.

"Be careful, it's a looooooong way down, don't look down Kimi!" Yuu sang, as if trying to scare her into falling, giving up or looking down.

"Har har, very funny Yuu, I'd like to see you do thi-" and Kimi's lapse in concentration caused her left foot to slip. Yuu yelped like a frightened puppy but Kimi recovered quickly, re-placing her foot and continuing to ascend. "Ha! Gotcha! I suggest you don't make me slip again, its a long way down after all!" Kimi sang back, as though she had faked the move to make Yuu regret her words, when really her heart was pounding against her ribs madly. Yuu squirmed, learning her lesson and plonking herself down on the floor with a sigh of relief.

"I'm impressed, you're quite athletic" Yuu laughed as Kimi reached the lowest branch without any more problems, about 25 foot from the ground. She sat with her legs crossed for a moment to regain her breath and nerves. Yuu applauded enthusiastically from the ground and Kimi flexed a weak arm muscle like a body builder.

"Next time YOU are doing this, got it!? I'll even teach you how to climb" she called back down. She straddled the branch she was on, not daring enough to walk along it on her feet, and slowly pulled herself along the branch, picking oranges and throwing them down at Yuu as she went.

"Hey watch were your throwing, you need to work on your aim... Ok ok that's enough! Kimi! don't get carried away!" Yuu called, dodging a few that were aimed for her head, missing more and more of them, dancing around like a headless chicken "Kimi you can stop noowww!" and suddenly a shout came from behind them. A woman came striding down the road behind them looking furious.

"Thieves! Thieves stealing the fruit!" she shouted. At that moment Kimi had been giggling to herself while trying to stand upright on the tree branch and move back to climb down. The sudden shout made Kimi jump and she wobbled while in mid turn, her foot got twisted as she tried to regain her balance. She flailed her arms around like she was trying to flap wings, and finally fell.

She was plummeting to the ground head first, she put her arms out, crossed across her head as if to protect herself.

Kimi was suddenly engulfed by an intense white light as she came only meters away from the ground.

Yuu watched as she crashed like some sort of comit and a cloud of dust erupted on impact.

"Kimi!" Yuu squealed, dropping the oranges and dived down into the dust cloud, coughing.

"I'm fine, I'm ok!" she coughed too having inhaled a lot of the dust, rubbing her arms where she had landed. She was more confused than hurt.

"No your not ok! You could have died!" Yuu flapped, panicking.

Kimi didnt answer. She was more confused than she was hurt. _**What was that glow? Did it break my fall?... I should have been more hurt than this... I couldn't have imagined it, I'm not hurt so something has to have happened! **_she thought, starting to zone out again. The woman's next shout bought her back to reality.

As the woman got closer, calling the two girls every name under the sun, Kimi noticed Yuu's eyes close, she seemed to be counting to ten, quivering in anger slightly.

"You thieves get out of here" she shouted again, not caring that one of the girls had just fell 25 feet from a tree. "Little brats I'm sick of you thinking you can take our-" and she cut off. Yuu had finally turned around to the woman with a face like thunder just as the she was about to get the back of Yuu's collar. She stopped dead. "Oh... Yuuga Murasaki... I'm sorry, I thought you were kids from the neighbouring district, I didn't see your face or recognise your friend..." she looked guilty.

"And in all the time you were walking behind me you didn't once recognise the Murasaki family crest? Surely being a member of our village for these many long years you would recognise it" she demanded, pointing to the pink cherry blossom on the back of Kimi's Yukata. The woman bowed her head, ashamed. "I'm sorry... are you ok?" she offered a hand down to Kimi.

"Yeah I'm fine, no worries." Kimi smiled accepting her hand and was pulled up from the floor. "Were not stealing, we're running and errand for Mr. Kusuri-"

"Say no more, my apologies. Take as many as you need" she smiled apologetically again.

"Thank you. We would have called someone over to help us but no-one was near here, so we tried to get them ourselves even though were inexperienced" Yuu explained, still visibly annoyed. She accepted a basket from the woman and stored a handful of oranges.

* * *

AN: That's chapter 3. It was nearly 15k words long but I cut it up to make it easier to read and less boring. Maybe I'll make later chapters longer if they aren't as crap and boring as these ones.

I imagine life in the Rukon to be different to what we know, they wouldn't use electricity or cars, have super markets. It would be very rural. They would probably rely on their crops and the rest of their community for survival.

And... they wouldn't have computers so they would have to go outside and help people or explore for fun! :)


	4. Problems in Paradise

I don't own Bleach, Idk why i bother saying that, its obvious really, If i owned Bleach i wouldn't be writing here, I'd be a millionaire T.T

* * *

Chapter 4 – Problems in Paradise

They soon continued around the vegetable patches, collecting a few things on the list.

Kimi watched the villagers work while speaking to them and offered to try and dig up the items herself. She again rolled her sleeves up, dug her feet into the soft soil and pulled. A giant daikon radish shot out of the ground, making her lose her footing again and fall back into the dirt. She and everyone around her howled with laughed. She didn't care, they weren't laughing at her, they were laughing with her. She had been having so much fun that Yuu literally had to pull her away from a patch of potato's.

They thanked them for letting them get involved once finished and moved on toward their next destination.

Kimi felt so welcomed by the villagers. Yuu had again introduced her to the people who asked who she was, most of them noticing that they didn't recognise her. They had all been very friendly and helpful to her. Not one of them had turned their noses up or ignored her. She couldn't help but beam brightly when she was greeted.

The next place Yuu showed her was slightly out of the way, but they needed to head that direction to peel bark from a certain type of tree. Yuu took Kimi up into the hillside, surrounded by yet more trees, but the last thing Kimi expected to find was a large meadow. For as far as the eyes could see lush grass covered the hills with vibrant flowers of every colour imaginable that blew around gently in the breeze. Even with the high midday sun on Kimi's back, the large open space made the wind feel cooler, so she couldn't help but shiver when her arm was covered in goosebumps.

"Beautiful huh? This is where the little ones often come to play. In the spring and summer its covered in flowers, but in autumn and winter there are piles of leaves everywhere from the surrounding trees and thick snow, so it's a great place to play all year round" Yuu explained, sitting down for a few minutes to give her slightly aching feet a rest. Kimi was in much worse shape than her and therefore felt even worse. Stitch in her ribs from climbing the hill, aching feet, tight breathing. If this was the sort of thing she would be doing around her every day she would need to exercise a lot.

"Yeah it's amazing, there's so many pretty sights around here, though It's hard to imagine this place being any different"

"Your probably going to live here for the rest of your life so you'll get to see it plenty more" she smiled.

"I can live with that" and after a while lying in the sun to rest their feet, they continued across the meadow to the other side. Coming to stand on the edge of the hill, Kimi came to see yet another beautiful sight, which this time made her mouth drop open again. She had been surprised by the vegetable patch, but this was something else entirely. A large lake in the middle of the mountains, and bright pink cherry blossom tree's covering it.

"Woooooww" she mouthed. "I loved that cherry blossom outside of my bedroom but this is just..."

"Yeah I thought you might like it because of that, I noticed you seemed fascinated by the blossoms. Is it safe to say that this is your favourite place so far?"

"Definitely! Come on lets go already" she yelled enthusiastically, grabbing Yuu's wrist and tugging her along to a row of long and steep stone steps, descending the mountain into the lakeside. They left the mass of bright, shining, vibrant colours and descended into the lake which was shadowed by the mountains due to the current position of the sun, and therefore seemed darker and quieter with the dark, cold grey stone around them.

They finally reached the bottom of the steps, which took a few minutes even with Kimi tugging them along and trying not to break her neck along the way. The sides of the lake were lined with worn stone pavements, so it was obviously a popular place that people often walked along. Though there were no fences around the water's edge, you could just dive in if you really wanted to, but regardless of how energetic she felt she decided against it, for some reason it didn't feel appropriate.

Yuu showed her across a long, sturdy, wooden bridge, it was slightly arched across the water, with red bars to hold on to and the floor beneath them a varnished, mahogany brown. At the start of the bridge was a plaque reading: Shiizun Jinja.

"A Shrine?" she asked curiously. "Can we go check it out?"

"Yeah this is the shrine of our village, go ahead."

They came to stop in front of a large wooden shrine. It was covered in little slips of paper tied to bars on one side, in the middle was a bell and rope, with a box at the bottom.

"We come here once every season to make a wish. We pray at this shrine for good health, fortune, luck, peace and other things. Whatever your heart desires really. Everyone swears by it, most wishes seem to come true. We usually make a small festival of it but because your new here and you missed the Spring festival, do you want to make your wish? Doesn't matter that your not dressed up or anything, I don't think the gods will mind" Yuu laughed.

Kimi thought hard for a moment. _**What would I wish for? Luck, fortune, health, happiness, knowledge?**_ There were so many things racing through her head. But she just decided to make her first wish short and simple. She came out of her thinking trance, in which she was sure her brain could be heard ticking away from the effort of the task, and took a small slip of paper from a little wooden box.

Dipping the brush into the provided ink she wrote "I wish that my entire time here is great. I want to do well in Harumachi" she didn't really know how to word the wish, but keeping things simple wasn't a bad thing. She folded up the paper without showing Yuu and tied it to the already crowded bars with all of the other wishes. Yuu gave her a small, dark, round coin with a hole in the middle and she dropped it into the box below the bell. She then pulled the rope to ring the bell, clapped twice and prayed for a moment.

She turned around to Yuu and smiled. "I hope my wish comes true like everyone else's"

"What did you wish for?" Yuu asked curiously.

Kimi made an indignant 'Tsk'ing noise. "I can't tell you that, aren't wishes broke if you tell them? it'll never come true if I tell you, you should know that"

"Oh right yeah, sorry" Yuu waved, realising what she was doing.

"No worries. Just never tell anyone a wish you just made, k?" Yuu nodded in agreement. "So, where to next?" Kimi asked, totally up for more sight seeing.

"Only one more place left now, we just have to follow the river upstream, but we need to peel some bark off the blossom tree's first." which they set to right away. Yuu obviously being more skilled than Kimi, she took this job. Kimi being too worried about damaging the tree or the bark, she sat on top of the bridge post above the Shiizun Jinja plaque watching intently.

Yuu finished quickly and came back over to her, holding the bark they needed and a large, pale pink cherry blossom. She fixed it in Kimi's hair and they continued upstream, Yuu pulling Kimi along now as revenge for the flight of steps.

As they followed the river, the scenery changed again, leaving the cherry blossoms behind and came back into lush green forest again. A few mile along the river, they finally came to a basin with a large waterfall towering high above them. The water was crystal clear with a teal blue shine to it.

"This is the Ryuutaki river, it comes from high in the mountains and unless we go out of the district, this is the furthest we can go. We often come here to play in the water when its hot. This is also our drinking water. It's completely clean and pure. Our bathing water comes from the river that passes near town too, the pipes bring it into our homes."

She felt like she was repeating herself a lot but she couldn't help it, it was the truth, and other than those simple words, she was rendered speechless. "It's so pretty. I love this place..."

Yuu beamed, knowing it was a job well done again, happy that she could please Kimi. "So, down to business!" Yuu pulled her book out to show Kimi the two plants they needed. One was an aquatic riverbed plant that looked like seaweed, the other was a white lotus. "If you like a can get the aquatic plant, you can collect the lotuses, they are blooming perfectly at this time of the month so it's important we collect as many as possible." she handed another basket to Kimi and without waiting for an answer she dived into the basin.

"Damn it Yuu, could have waited for me.. right.. white lotus, white lotus..." She scanned the river and found one quite soon, hugging the river bank as if not wanting to be swept away by the flow. She rolled her yukata up, tucking it loosely into her underwear, just enough to cover herself but not get the bottom of the yukata wet. After a while, even though she wasn't massively confident at swimming, she had no choice but to wade out of the shallower river and into the edge of the basin. Yuu surfaced quite close to her to get some air and dived again. By the time Yuu had finally found this seaweed Kimi had already collected over twenty lotuses, all piled up neatly in the basket, which could hold small amounts of water to keep them moist.

Yuu added the seaweed to the basket, and thinking Kimi's nervousness of deep water was funny, she pushed her into the water head first. Kimi flailed around for a moment like an angry cat in a bathtub, and then realised it wasn't so bad. She pulled Yuu in too and they had a small water fight, pushing each other round a bit, until a call came from the top of the waterfall.

They stared around for the position of the speaker and saw two black robed figures stood there above them looking down. They both made a jump and landed neatly at the side of the river without looking in the slightest bit hurt. Kimi looked shocked... _**I fell from that high tree and would have killed myself if it wasn't for that white light.. but these two can jump from a giant waterfall and be completely unharmed... that is not normal... **_she thought.

"Identify yourselves" a tall man demanded. Kimi noticed something glint at his right side and backed away in horror. A sword, he was holding the hilt so that it was slightly out of its scabbard. The woman beside him did the same, the metal shining brightly.

Yuu immediately dropped her calm and playful attitude, she stood up in the shallow part and announced: "Yuuga and Kimiko Murasaki. Daughters of the leader's of Harumachi, Shinsetsu and Yoshino Murasaki, we are here on an errand for village business'."

The male Shinigami raised an eyebrow. "Very well. You two should finish your errand and get home fast, you should know it's not safe here." and without any explanation, the two disappeared into thin air. Yuu let out a sigh of relief and helped Kimi out in the shallow end and out of the river. She looked utterly terrified.

"Who were those people Yuu?"

"No one you need to worry about, trust me it's fine." She mumbled, not looking at Kimi but with her back turned, ringing the water out of her clothes.

"Nothing to worry about? Yuu, those guys were holding swords! You hear me? SWORDS, big long sharp pointy deadly things, and you tell me its nothing to worry about?" Kimi rushed all in one breath.

"Kimi chill, they wouldn't have attacked us anyway, they were just on patrol for criminals that's all. But they are right, we should get home soon" she said pointing towards the sky. The sun had gone in and it was looking grey. Kimi gritted her teeth and agreed, fighting back all the questions she wanted to be answered.

They picked their baskets up and carried them on their back, running along the river fast, but they couldn't beat the downpour. The heavens opened within minutes, a mini monsoon pelting them like golf ball sized bullets.

Yuu pulled her over into the forest and they sheltered under the wild roots of a tall tree.

"We'll have to wait til' its over. April showers always take you by surprise, it's always when you least expect it." Kimi nodded and sat against the tree roots uncomfortably. They were in a small cave sort of area where the tree had been slightly uprooted and caused an opening to form.

Kimi took an orange out of her basket and threw one to Yuu, not saying anything. She felt betrayed that something was going on right under her nose, but no-one would tell her, she was to be kept in the dark. It gave her an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach. One of uncertainty. She tried to imagine what it could be that they were hiding and all sorts of far fetched ideas came into her mind.

"Yuu?" she finally asked, deciding to change the subject slightly to something she was curious about, something that Yuu would most likely answer.

"Yeah?" she asked discarding her orange skin on the floor beside her.

"Is this how everyone treats the Murasaki family?"

"Hmm? What do you mean?"

"How everyone in the village acts towards you, do the Murasaki's get special privileges for being the leaders of the village?" Kimi asked. She wasn't angry or anything, just curious.

"Well, I guess you could say that we have some privileges but the whole village is more like a family. We all care about each other like family and look out for one another. It's true that I'm popular because I'm the leader's daughter and I'm kind of like a favourite, but you probably will be too. It's more like a respect sort of thing. We are good leaders and everyone respects us for how well we treat the villagers and how well we run this place and keep it in order. They respect us for giving them such a wonderful life. As long as your work their fair share and don't cause trouble, everyone will treat you as an equal. I think they like you already"

Kimi nodded. "Because I helped them with my own share of work right?"

"Right. Most would just stand there and wait for their vegetable to be picked for them, but even though your new you opted to get your hands dirty straight away"

"This place is my home now, If these people treat me well then I want to do the same and give something back to them in any way I can, as a thank you. I can't stand by and expect everyone to spoon feed me and do everything for me. No offence Yuu, but i'm going to steer away from the 'Popular daughter' thing and work for my respect" Kimi said, a determined fire flickering in her eyes.

Yuu shook her head and laughed "No offence taken, I work hard because I feel that even though I'm just a daughter, I have a responsibility in the village and I should be like a role model for the little kids. Dad always taught me that being a lazy leader earns no respect. I am the heir to the village one day, If I am to be a good leader I need to get involved"

"That's a good way to think and it really works, I mean only one day for me. The village seems like such a luxurious haven, nothing bad happens here, it's great" Kimi yawned, stretching her arms back behind her head, closing her eyes and listening to the rainfall.

Yuu gave a pained smile and looked away out at the rain too. "You really are lucky."

"Iv heard that at least three times since I arrived here" Kimi giggled.

"No, really, your lucky. Not every village is like ours, and we have worked hard over hundreds of years to make our village a safe haven. It wasn't always like this." Yuu explained. Kimi opened her eyes to see Yuu looking slightly upset. She stared questioningly. "Let me explain, I hope you can understand this, there's a lot to take in. I'll also answer your questions from earlier."

"I'll try."

"Well. Harumachi is in district two of the Soul ociety. The lower the district number the closer we are to the centre of the soul society, the Seireitei. The closer you are to that area the safer it becomes. The higher districts that are further away from the law and order of the Seireitei are dangerous and violent slums where life is hard, every day is a fight for survival there. You are so lucky that you didn't end up in one of those places, they are the completely opposite to Harumachi and the first districts."

"I guess you are right then... I'm glad I ended up here"

"Even Harumachi wasn't a very safe place until a few hundred years ago when the Noble's cleaned the place up. But we, as the leaders swore that that sort of life of crime and poverty was not what we wanted. We decided to treat each and every person in the village as family, care for one another, help each other, be as one. Even though we are second district and not first, I would say we are the best town in the whole soul society. I've experienced the bad side of life here and I wouldn't wish it upon anybody"

Kimi paused. "I had no idea it could be like that here... I thought everywhere was like Harumachi..."

"Don't worry about it, your new here, it would be impossible for you to know and understand everything the second you wake up, you need to learn things" she smiled again, and Kimi spotted a glimmer of tears in her eyes. She looked away, feeling slightly ashamed for making her upset.

A few moments of silence passed before she decided to ask more questions. "By the way, when you said nobles, you mean there are noble families? Like lords or governors?"

"Yeah. The noble families live in these first districts and inside the Seireitei. Most of the noble families are are Soul Reapers anyway. We are descendants of the first nobles who settled in Harumachi hundreds of years ago, that's why leadership of the village was handed down our bloodline. All of this is the reason Harumachi is a great village and we are so respected. We took people away from lives of hell and gave them a chance to life in luxury, and they adore us for it."

Kimi nodded and smiled. "I understand now, and I'm now even more glad to be part of it all. But now another question...what is a soul reaper?" She still wanted that question answering. Yuu laughed slightly at Kimi's question and determination to find out, it was visibly bugging her.

"That's a long story."

"You said you would answer it." Kimi snarled, determined to not let her go back on her word.

"All right, those people we saw earlier were soul reapers."

"I knew it!"

"The Soul Reapers live in the Seireitei, They were black uniforms, carry swords and they often patrol around these area's. They keep law and order around the soul society and take care of spiritual matters in the world of the living"

Kimi tried to remember those black robes in her mind's eye, but almost instantly she blacked out again. For the second time that day, a fast paced film played behind her eyes. A girl wearing tight black leggings, a black jumper and black slippers stood shortly in front of her holding a sword and slicing through monster like creatures, A blonde man with a white cloak over the top of the black uniform, and a dark skinned, dark haired woman wearing the same. She was stood next to her smiling kindly as she explained something, even though it was obvious that she was talking her facial features were oddly blurred and distorted, but the film was mute. She couldn't hear a word the woman was saying. Yuu's voice rang inside her head, snapping her back to reality again.

"Kimi! Kimiko wake up!" Yuu sang. She was leaning over to her waving her hand in Kimi's face. She had zoned out again.

"... Sorry"

"What's wrong? You look pale..." she asked placing a hand on Kimi forehead to feel her temperature. "You haven't caught a cold from the rain have you?"

"No, I think a piece of my memory came back to me"

"Oh? Is that a good thing?" and Kimi explained what she saw to Yuu. "Well... I'm not an expert on soul reapers but they often enter the village. What you saw was definitely a soul reaper and her captain's. Though I've never met a captain before."

"So those were soul reapers protecting me? They are really good guys?"

"Yes, Soul Reapers are the good guys and they would never kill an innocent person. They are here to protect; and I'm guessing the monster was a hollow. I've heard stories about them too. Maybe you can ask a soul reaper about your memory if you see one around"

"Maybe if I get chance." Kimi said, drawing her legs up to her chest and laying her head on her knees. Yuuga continued to look concerned.

"Lets wait for the rain to stop and we'll get you home."

The rain lasted a long time, for what felt like hours, but Kimi didn't feel well enough to walk out in heavy rain and cold wind, she would surely catch a cold. So they waited. And waited. And waited more until a ray of sunlight broke through the dismal grey clouds. Yuu shook Kimi, who was in a light snooze on her knees still.

She announced that she knew a short cut through the woods and over the hills that would stop them walking the long way they came from. They made it back to the village within twenty minutes or so that way.

They dropped the heavy buckets of water from the waterfall at the Shiruku Family Tailors with their many thanks and continued to Mr. Kusuri the physician. He too was delighted to see them.

"Welcome back girls, I was worried you got caught in the rain storm"

"We did, but we found somewhere to shelter until it ended, so were fine" Yuu told him, dropping the basket of fruit down beside him. Kimi also placed down the basket of plants and flowers. He examined them all for a moment, checking they had bought back the correct items.

"Excellent, what a fine job you did, and as promised here is your reward" he handed both of them a handful of coins, the same as the one Yuu had given her earlier at the shrine. "There's 300 Kan each, help yourself to something from the bakery." he smiled.

They both thanked him with a small bow and waved goodbye.

"So do you want to go home and rest or get a bite to eat?" Yuu asked, still looking concerned of Kimi's little episode earlier.

"I'm fine, lets go get some food, I'm starving." Kimi agreed, stretching and tapping her grumbling belly. Yuu gave her another funny look, shook her head and carried on walking.

* * *

A/N: I decided to change the way of life in my village. I wanted it to be more of a luxurious, idilic life that would go well with Kimiko's background of nobility, I hope I explained it well :)

I also got the ideas for the areas visited from my favourite maps in various MMO games I've played, as i looooooovee taking screenshots in games, the graphics and beautiful scenery are what really draw me in and hook me :3

When writing, drawing and thinking I always listen to music, it sometimes helps scenes play in my mind like an anime or the lyrics give me ideas.

For this chapter i was listening to: Tsumugi Uta/Spinning song – A cover by Yamai, a beautiful chinese style (with japanese lyrics) vocaloid song, which talks about the spring, time passing and seasons changing, perfect for Harumachi and Kimiko's time there.

Btw, if your not very familar with/good at Japanaese, Harumachi = Spring Village.

I won't be using many Japanese terms as i think you should either stick to one or the other, not mix Japanese in with an english story, but i'll make up things where appropriate.

One more thing: Character Profiles! This is my little way of giving you some info on my OC's, they will change as the characters develop over time.

Shinsetsu Murasaki:

Middle aged (Around 40-50). Tall, fairly slim but getting slightly podgy from eating a lot and not exercising much. He has messy black hair and emerald green eyes. He is always seen wearing a Kimono of some sort, for business he will wear better quality clothes where as he will wear old grey Kimono's for lazing around the Murasaki manor.  
He is the leader of the Murasaki clan and Harumachi. He's very warm and kind and loves nothing more than spending time with family and villagers. He's very social, helpful and caring. Kimi's appearance made him over joyed to have another loveable daughter.

His character was inspired by Shigure Souma from Fruits basket as you may be able to tell if youve watched/read it. I've tried to make him as different from Shigure as much as I can, I promise

Yoshino Murasaki:

A tall, beautiful and elegant woman in her late thirties/early fourties. She has long, straight black hair and hazel eyes. She is a very good house wife who has less to do with the management of the clan and village than Yuuga and Shinsetsu, but cares about her immediate family more than anything. She doesn't have Shinsetsu's playfulness and energetic nature. She is very calm and formal, she and Shin often disagree on things but not to the extent of huge arguements, as seen when speaking to Kimi for the first time.

Yuuga Murasaki:

Yuu is the spitting image of her mother but with her fathers eyes. Her hair is also black, short and straight in the style of a Kokeshi doll. She is about half a foot taller than Kimi and slightly more developed, giving her more of an older sister look when the two are together. She gave off the impression of an excited child when she first met Kimi, due to not having friends of her own age, but she is actually very calm like her mother and caring like her father.

Kimiko Murasaki:

Kimi is only getting her bearings at the moment, adjusting to this life. She has collar bone length, straight but messy, midnight purple hair (that is to say it is one shade away from black, so it most looks black but shines purple in the light.) and piercingly ice blue eyes. She is very concious, curious and nervous of her surroundings at the moment, but that will change in time.  
Kimi's Character will progress further down the line of my story, I think maybe I will do a Char Profile for her every Chapter that has significant progress to Kimi's Character. (e.g Attitude, Feelings, Powers, Appearance and Etc)

Small japanese lesson!

If anyone wondered, in Japanese Kimiko means Noble Child, or Unique Child. (Kimi meaning You, or in this sense "Not like you" (Unique), also i've seen it translated into monarch which is obviously a form of nobility, and Ko meaning Kodomo, Child.

Yuuga means "elegant"

Yoshi means "Beauty",and Yoshino is a popular female name too :)

I can't remember how I made Shinsetsu's name, it was so long ago xD I'll remember some day.

Murasaki means Purple or Amethyst, which is my favourite colour/stone and Purple is often associated with power, wealth, noblility and high status. You may have noticed Omaeda's purple shirt, the purple lining on Aizen's cloak, Rukia Violet eyes and more :)

Hope you enjoyed, and it should be getting more Interesting and Bleach-like soon so if it's crap don't give up on me yet! Review please~~


	5. Loneliness, Training & Settling in

Not gonna bother saying it T.T

* * *

**Chapter 5 – Loneliness, Training and Making herself at home**

Kimi stared as Yuu walked away. "What? What did I do this time? What was that look for?" She called to Yuu, confused by the funny look she gave her.

"It's nothing... I'll tell you in a minute"

"What the heeelll! Why do people say 'It's nothing'? If it was nothing you wouldn't have done it in the first place! You wouldn't give me a funny look just cause you felt like it would ya'?! There's always a reason! If you do something like that it means something so tell me what it means! I don't get iiiit!" Kimi raged in one long breath.

"Whoa! Chill! I said I'll explain in a moment, It's another long story you see. Lets get our food then I'll tell you."

Kimi glared at her silently "'Kay." Resigning reluctantly and preparing for her to break her promise again, but she soon forgot about it when she reached the bakery. The smell floated out of the open shop door and down the road, the scent of freshly baked bread smacking her in the face like she had walked head first into a brick wall.

She took a long sniff of the air and ran ahead into the shop, her little round coins at the ready in hand.

There were rows and rows of savouries and desserts in all shapes, colours and designs. The ones that particularly caught Kimi's eyes were the most colourful ones, which had little faces drawn on them in chocolate icing.

Yuu wandered in behind her and did the same, taking a long gulp of air.

"What's this one?" Kimi asked the smiling old woman behind the counter, pointing towards a bright pink round ball with a smiling cat face drawn on it.

"That's Mochi, it's similar to Dango but with a filling. We have Jam, Ice-cream, cream, fruit or jelly."

"I'll have a raspberry jam Mochi please!" Kimi demanded, her mouth watering excitedly.

"Kimi slow down would ya'. You should look at the other desserts too, they don't only make Japanese foods, there's things from all over the world here"

"That's true miss, People from every corner of the globe live in soul society, but the Japanese way of living is very popular. We also have English, American, Chinese and other exotic foods here."

"I never thought of that... Of course everyone here can't be Japanese. But still, I'm gonna be here for along time so I have plenty of time to try everything" Kimi beamed. "So, 300 Kan worth of Mochi please!"

Yuu tapped her hand to her forehead despairingly, but the woman behind the counter obliged, picking an assortment of coloured Mochi balls, the majority raspberry jam but a few ice cream too. "You are the new Murasaki daughter aren't you?" the woman asked kindly, seemly an off-hand conversation.

Kimi nodded. "Yes, my name is Kimiko, I arrived here a few days ago but today is my first time out of the manor since I arrived."

"In that case, welcome to the village." She handed over a little wooden case filled with Mochi. "There are a few extra there as a welcome gift" the woman winked at her. Kimi beamed even brighter like an excited child and handed over her money, thanked the woman and waited for Yuu to choose her dessert.

Eventually, after a few minutes of scanning an huge assortment of food, she chose a Yum-yum. A British cake, twisted dough covered in sugar and icing, similar to a doughnut without a filling. She too paid and left.

"We soooooo have to go there more often, that woman was really kind! And the food..."

"You won't be getting freebies everyday you know, that was just a welcome gift" Yuu laughed at her far away expression again.

The sun had finally broke through the clouds now, returning to the comfortable spring weather they had been enjoying this morning, so rather than returning home Yuu took her along another of her many short cuts. There was a walk way behind the bakery which lead to the Ryuutaki river.

As Yuu had told her, it didn't run directly through the town but just past the outside of the town, so they sat at the river side on some carved tree stumps eating their desserts.

"Is this another place you often come to?" Kimi asked half sarcastically, knowing that the answer was yes and there would probably be a story behind it.

"Actually no" Kimi was surprised by this answer and actually paused while eating a green and red ball of watermelon Mochi.

"I haven't been here for many years because there has been no-one to join me. I used to come here when I was young with some other kids from the village. When the weather was nice and we wanted somewhere to play that was close to home, we came here. When we were a bit older we carved these stumps as somewhere to sit. But eventually we all went our separate ways, a few of my friends became soul reapers, Some moved towns, some just lost contact with me. Then I just did jobs around the village instead of hanging around with friends"

"It's sad that they all lost contact with you... but now you have me to hang around with, right?"

"Right!" she smiled then paused for a few moments to watch the fish in the river. "Kimi?"

"Uhm?" she mumbled, her mouth too full too speak.

"Are you actually hungry?"

"Of course I am, my appetite went through the roof as soon as I smelled last night's dinner. I've been running on empty all day, we really should have had breakfast before coming out of the manor, we need fuel for all these jobs we go on"

Yuu interrupted her, sounding more serious "So you were hungry like you would be if you were still alive? Belly pains, full stomach when you've finished eating, you can taste everything?"

"Yeeaahhhh, that's what hungry generally means Yuu, You're asking as if you don't feel like that"

"That's because I don't. I don't get hungry. That's why I gave you that funny look earlier. In the soul society you only get hungry if you have spiritual energy. If you don't have spiritual energy you will never be hungry."

Kimi blinked, somewhat confused. "So why do you eat if you don't need to?"

"Because we ate as living people, It's part of life, it's normal. We need something to enjoy, even though it doesn't fill us up and we can only barely taste it, eating is part of life. Food and eating is something taken for granted in the world of the living, but it's really so important to us, just to have something to enjoy."

"That makes sense. I can't imagine a life without food.. most of the things we do involve food in some way.."

Yuu nodded. "I'll inform my parents, they can keep an eye on you and make sure you are well fed. You'll be in trouble if you don't eat often, You'll feel weak because your are not keeping your spiritual energy stable. If you get hungry often you probably have high spirit energy. If that's the case then you may have to train to use it and keep it stable..."

"Train? How? Why? What does spiritual energy do? Is it like a special power?" Kimi asked, again taking too much information at once.

Yuu shook her head. "You're better off asking a soul reaper about this stuff. I know that spiritual energy is what soul reapers have, it's some sort of power, and it can be seen as a coloured aura. I saw a soul reaper playing with little kids in the village once, I'm not sure what he was doing but he had a blue aura of light around him"

"Light?" Kimi asked thoughtfully and the moment of falling from the orange tree flashed before her eyes. "That happened to me earlier! When I fell from that tree, my arms glowed with a bright white light and it broke my fall, that's why I wasn't hurt!" she paused again, deep in thought. "By training you mean I need to learn how to use my power and control it right?"

"Right."

"And if I do learn how to control it I will become a soul reaper?"

"Not exactly, you have to go to soul reaper school and go through all sorts of exams. It's really complicated. No Harumachi villagers have become soul reapers for over 100 years."

"Then I'll be the first Harumachi soul reaper in over 100 years!" Kimi announced ambitiously. "Wait... didn't you say someone of your friends became soul reapers? But... you are my age..."

Yuu laughed, this one really put an amusing baffled expression on Kimi's face. "Sorry I forgot to mention that. In the soul society the rate of ageing is totally different to the rate in the world of the living. You age slowly. I may look about your age but I'm actually 136"

Kimi nearly choked on her food. "What the hell! How is that possible?!"

"You'll get used to it. You too will age slowly. Your hair and nails will grow but your facial features and body will change slowly. You'll look 16 for many years."

Kimi shrugged. "That suits me just fine, at least I won't get wrinkles any time soon"

"That's exactly what I thought too!" Yuu chuckled.

"But if I can train my spirit energy and become good at controlling it, I'll surely become good enough to be a soul reaper"

"You should learn more about soul reapers and the things they can do before you commit yourself to it. You barely know anything about it, you don't know how to train either"

"If it takes tons of practise to use this spiritual stuff, and a ton of research then so be it, I'm prepared to do that. So far I know that soul reapers help people... Those people that helped me- no, saved me... I want to thank them and help people like they did, If that's what soul reapers do then I'm in!"

The corners of Yuu's lips twitched into a pained smile. "It's great for you to have a long term goal, it's something for you to strive for and if you work hard there's no doubt you'll get there"

She lowered her head a little so Kimi couldn't quite see and finished the last bite of her yum-yum. They both leaned down to the flowing water to rinse the sugar and icing off their hands but Yuu got up to leave before Kimi had finished.

"We should be getting home. It's getting late now and mom will be worried about us" and with that she walked away. Kimi blinked, wondering what was wrong with her. _**Did I offend her or something?**_

Kimi made it home just after Yuu, thankfully remembering her way and not getting lost, it was one long, straight dirt road out of the town and to the left after all. There wasn't really any way _to _get lost, but anything was possible with Kimi's clumsiness and absent-mindedness.

They made it home about 2 hours before dinner was due. In those 2 hours Kimi decided to have a nice long bath, mainly so Yuu could have some alone time, she wasn't in the mood for talking so she left her be, it had been a long and tiring day and what she needed the most right now was a long soak in a red hot bath. She needed to clean all the dirt off of herself before dinner and hot baths were the perfect thing to help concentrate and gather her thoughts.

Kimi's room was still empty and looked barely lived in. She would really need to spruce it up a little and get some books or something to occupy her in the time she wasn't out exploring.  
When she entered her bathroom she realised it was larger than it had first seemed. She had only entered just into the door way, to the sink and mirror, but around the corner it opened up into a larger space. A cupboard full of fresh clean towels, shampoo and to Kimi's delight, bubble bath!

She ran the water, emptying half a bottle of bubble bath into it, threw off her dusty yukata and stepped into the large steaming tub. The water wasn't unbearably hot but it was enough to make her skin red so she wouldn't be able to lie here for long.

She relaxed, remembering the events of the day. The two things that stuck out in her mind were that white light, and finding out it was spiritual energy.

She closed her eyes, visioning the white light in her mind's eye and trying to summon it again.

When it had happened she had tried to protect her body with her arms, and her arms had acted like a shield, forming the protective white light. She held her arms out again and tried to summon the light, but nothing happened.

"Maybe it's one of those stupid things that only happens when I need it most..." she grumbled aloud to herself.

But then another thought struck her. If it could use her arms as a shield, would she be able to summon it in similar places for different uses? Like at her feet to run faster or jump higher, to strengthen her arms or punch harder.

_**That would be awesome... **_she thought, wanting to try it out the second she got chance, but summoning the light seemed easier said than done. It would probably become easier with practise though.

After fourthy five minutes of pondering the meanings of spiritual energy and letting her imagination run wild at it's endless possibilities and things she could do with it, she realised she was burning up.

The water wasn't getting cooler and 45 minutes of sitting in steaming hot water was making her feel light headed.

She finally got out and retreated back into the comfort of her futon with a clean plain white bath robe.

For the remainder of the time until dinner she put her theories into action.

She sat up straight, legs crossed, concentrating heavily on her outstretched hands. In over an hour the most she managed to do was form a tiny sphere of light on the tip of her index finger, a bright white misty orb, like a miniature crystal ball. It was nothing impressive but it was a start.

When it happened she had been concentrating on her right hand so hard she was going red in the face. She felt like her hand was pulsing, like blood flow, but it wasn't, it was the flow of energy increasing. Instead of trying to make her whole hand glow she tried one single finger, and it worked.

She smiled ecstatically "Yes! Finally!"

She would keep trying to do the same thing over and over again until it became easy to do.

A shadow walked past her door. "Miss Kimiko, dinner is ready" a woman called, kneeling outside of her door without opening it or announcing her arrival.

_**Must be one of the maids**_ she thought, _**it doesn't look or sound like Yoshino or Yuu.**_ "Right I'll be there in a minute"

She had to stretch a bit. She had strained her arm muscles trying to force her hand to glow, which seemed silly. _**Its SPIRITUAL, If it had anything to do with my body it would be Physical. Spiritual is the mind **_she informed herself_**. **_

The Mind. _**That's it!**_ More ideas clicked of how to possibly make it easier but she would try after dinner or tomorrow.

She threw on another Kimono that was hanging in her closet, this time grey with pink flowers, and rushed over to dinner.

She returned to her room a while later, pleasantly full again. Considering she had eaten less than 2 hours before dinner she was starving again when she actually got there.

The meal hadn't been as extravagant as it was the previous night, as that had been more of a celebration, but they had laid out plenty of delicious food.

She was truly impressed now, considering the rest of the family didn't get hungry and could barely taste the food, or so Yuu told her anyway, they were exceptional cooks.

Kimi guessed that Yuu had already spoken to her parents about Kimi's hunger and they had made sure to fatten her up like Christmas dinner.

She suddenly had random mental images of them fattening her up with food, throwing her into a cooking pot, cooking her and eating shook that idle thought out of her head.

_**As if, I don't even know if you can get fat here.**_

Again she made herself comfortable on top of her futon. She wasn't tired and it wasn't even getting dark yet so bedtime was out of the question, and the only thing she had to keep her occupied was her little white light. So that settled it.

Now on a full stomach, she sat upright, closed her eyes and cleared her mind of idle thoughts. Though it wasn't easy and stupid thoughts kept popping into her mind like bad smells.

She envisioned the white light and her body igniting up like a light bulb in her minds eye and out stretched her arms again, as she had done when it had first appeared.

To her delight, the room was aglow with a brilliant white light emitting from her own body. She cheered with a wide grin on her face. "It's just like Yuu described, an aura... what a sensation, it feels like energy is coursing through me" the air around her felt different, more dense, and her hair flew around like a breeze was blowing. Though it lasted no longer than a minute, Kimi enjoyed every second and continued to try.

She spent hours that night trying to make her hands and feet glow, which she succeeded on numerous times.

She couldn't help but laugh as she imagined what it might look like to someone outside of the room, like someone was playing with an extremely bright flash light for hours on end.

But in her tiny little bedroom she could do nothing with this power. She had nothing to test out on, so eventually she stopped. A combination of her nicely heated bedroom, her comfortable futon and a tired body made her easily drift off to sleep.

The next morning was a repeat of the previous day, although somewhat less disorientating.

Kimi was woken by Yuu again, this time she crept in slowly and nudged her, rather than scaring the living daylights out of her.

"Wake up, It's eight" Yuu whispered shaking Kimi lightly.

"All right, ok, I'm getting up" she grumbled groggily.

"Good, we've got some shopping to do, Mom is joining us"

"Oh yeah? Why is that?"

"Were going shopping for you dummy. Meet us out on the courtyard again, k?" and she left, closing the door behind her.

Again Kimi lay there allowing herself to wake up and eyes adjust before washing and dressing herself.

It seemed that Yuu had took note of Kimi's mention of breakfast yesterday. Yoshino was carrying a box of sandwiches, which she offered to Kimi when they met in the yard 20 minutes later.

"Thanks, it's always good to have breakfast, it gives you energy for the rest of the day" Kimi repeated what she had said to Yuu yesterday, munching away at an pork and stuffing sandwich.

Yoshino smiled and nodded in agreement. "Me and Shin are usually up before Yuu and when she wakes up she rushes out before we get chance to see her, never mind feed her. But don't worry, we'll be having breakfast from now on whether were going out or not"

"The last thing we want is you feeling weak Kimi" Yuu agreed.

She smiled again. It was nice to know they cared so much about her. "Thanks. So... where are we going?"

"Just into the village. You've been here days and you still have no personal belongings, furniture or your own clothes" Yoshino said with a sigh.

"Yeah I know, I've thought about it when walking into my plain bedroom a few times already, I guess it would be nice to have my own belongings" Kimi pondered. "Though I don't have any money, how am I supposed to pay for stuff?"

Yoshino laughed "My dear, you really think I would make you pay for things when you have no money? I'll pay don't you worry. When you have your own money you can pay for yourself, but you can't walk around in the same clothes every day" she looked at the dusty purple yukata that she had also wore yesterday.

"Of course, it's not fair for you to spend on me but I'll accept just this once"

"Not that you had the choice to decline" Yuu chuckled under her breath.

"Then first we'll head to the tailors. Clothes are the most important." They spent what felt like hours in the tailor shop, though it probably was hours.

Yoshino had insisted that they first choose 4 Kimono's for Kimi for the season festivals, so Kimi had to be measured and fitted. To Kimi's horror the tailor commented on her measurements out loud.

"34 inch bust... 24 waist... 32 hips... exactly 5 foot tall, my my you are petite. Your size is in the middle of adult and child average sizes so we will have to make these custom for you"

Kimi whimpered uncomfortably. "Did you have to say that out loud?"

"Nothing wrong with being small, small is cute" Yuu patted her on the shoulder.

"Easy for you to say!" Yuu was at least a head taller than Kimi, curvier and bigger chested. Not to mention she had her mothers clear smooth skin, emerald green eyes and the almost carved facial features of a Japanese doll.

Kimi on the other hand was short, had a small chest, a round face and a little round button nose and creepy ice coloured eyes. She couldn't even be mistaken as a blood relative of the Murasaki's. The only thing similar between them was the straight, jet black hair, but even then if Kimi was to step into bright light or sun light it would glint a poisonous purple.

It was obvious from a mile away that they were not related, and she felt inferior for it.

They spent a long time looking through styles and colours of kimonos for the seasons festivals. Yoshino and Kimi were not in agreement on which to pick. Kimi found after trying on a few different styles, that she had an affliction to covering her legs.

"I don't know, it's weird, my legs just feel hot and uncomfortable when they are covered, especially by the warm fabric" Kimi tried to explain to them while fidgeting uncomfortably "I prefer the cool air around my legs" the others sighed and agreed to let her pick a short Kimono for Spring and Summer, but she had no choice but to wear long ones for autumn and winter, they wouldn't take no for an answer no matter how much she complained.

Once the colours and designs of the kimono's were picked Kimi moved on to the casual clothes.

She again wouldn't wear anything that covered her legs, and she picked more shorts than skirts.

"You do realise that in the winter you will have to wear trousers or tights" Yoshino informed her as she picked through the choices of shorts, short yukata dresses and skirts.

"I know that but when it's warm I get too hot. I like shorts they're comfortable" She was also drawn to darker colours. black, blue's and purple's in particular.

"Kimi, you're female, you need to wear something a bit more feminine!" Yuu frowned as Kimi ignored the sunset yellow T-shirt and made a beeline for a black one with red patterns all over it.

"It is feminine! It's made for females not men so of course it's feminine, there's nothing wrong with it"

"I mean the colours! And you can't wear black all of the time. And you must remember that certain colours and patterns have meanings. Warm colours like red's and yellow's represent the warm seasons and cold colours like blue's and blacks represent the cold seasons, or even night time. And sometimes individual colours have meanings" Yuu tried to explain to her, as though she had swallowed and regurgitated a book.

"Then I'll wear black and pink for spring, black and green for summer, black and gold for autumn and black and blue for winter, that better?"

Yuu and Yoshino both face palmed in unison. "There's no reasoning with her is there?" Yoshino asked.

"Seems not" Yuu agreed as Kimi grinned triumphantly and scooted off to the cold-colour section.

So eventually after a few hours of fitting, measuring, scanning around the store and trying to reason with Kimi on what to wear and what might suit her, they finally got the four Kimono's and bunch of casual clothes and moved on.

They did a little more shopping and ended up with an array of items from books for Kimi to read, to hair products and jewellery.

"Maaaan all of this shopping has made me hungry" Kimi grumbled rubbing her aching belly with her wrist, as both of her hands were occupied by heavy bags.

"We can stop off at the bakery on our way back if you like?" Yuu asked, waiting for her head to flick up and that grin to spread across her face.

"Sounds good to me! I need to sample the rest of the shop as soon as possible" Kimi said enthusiastically and sped up her pace a little.

They did indeed stop off at the bakery and this time Kimi chose a cream doughnut with caramel icing. Yoshino had a chicken sandwich and Yuu had double chocolate cookies. They sat outside the shop on a shaded table while eating and chatting about their purchases.

Kimi felt something warm brush against her leg and jumped, something ran under the table startled by her movement. She looked down to see a large and fluffy brown tabby cat crouching warily below her.

"Aww, Hi there little guy, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you" she apologised offering her hand to it. It quickly changed its mind and rubbed it's head in her hand.

Kimi chuckled as it stared up at her, curling it's tail around her leg happily.

"Kimi I think he wants something from you" Yoshino laughed.

"Wants something?" sure enough the cat was now eyeing up her doughnut with gleaming yellow eyes. "You want this cream huh?" It's ear flicked at the sound of the word 'cream' and he curled around her leg again. "Ok but only a little bit, dairy isn't good for cats"

Soon after they got up to leave and the cat, whose name was Aoi accord to the silver tag around his neck, looked utterly depressed as he watched them leave.

"Yoshino... Can we have a kitten?" Kimi asked quickly, hoping she wouldn't realise what she was agreeing to.

"Absolutely not. I like animals but they are troublesome to look after"

"What if I look after it myself?"

"No."

"But-"

"No Kimi." she said firmly.

She looked away from Yoshi with a scowl on her face "Ok." she resigned, really disappointed. She felt such a connection with the cat, and it crossed her mind for a moment that maybe she had had pets in her past life, but if Yoshino said no then the answer was no. End of discussion.

She spent the rest of her day in her room, moving around her furniture and reorganising things.

She had a new desk of draws in which she kept her books, some pens and pencils and paper in case she felt like doing something creative. Yuu had even bought her a diary and advised her to jot her thoughts down in there.

"You have a lot of things going on at the moment, especially with settling in and your memories coming back to you occasionally, maybe you'll find offloading your thoughts onto paper helpful" she had suggested when handing her a purple leather-bound book of blank pages. She put the diary to one side, doubting that she would ever use it.

She had also got a lamp for her desk, a mirror on her wall, a clock, a puffy pillow and new bed sheets and blankets.

Yoshino had been to the furniture store and bought her a bed that was more like a raised platform, just off the ground in height and padded, so it was softer than the floor and slightly raised. She was yet to notice a difference just from sitting on her new bed-futon but maybe it would be more comfy.

She had also bought a jewellery and accessory box for her bathroom where she now kept a few hair ribbons and clips.

After changing her mind several times and re-organising everything to suit her tastes she stood back to admire her work. She felt like a clean freak, obsessed with everything being in its correct position, neat and tidy. There was much more to be added. It did feel a little more like home, like a place of her own now but there were still things to do.

She picked up a book from her desk and threw herself onto her bed with a satisfying bounce.

* * *

Eeehhh, Don't think i've got anything to ramble on about...

Just a little bit about Yuuga here which will hopefully play a part later on. Hope you enjoyed :)


	6. Steady Progression

Big time skipu!

Are the length of the chapters good? Better? Too short? Need to be longer? It's bugging me

* * *

Chapter 6 – Steady Progession

Over time Kimi finally began to feel completely at home. Her settling in, chores, jobs and exploring kept her busy and these days she very rarely thought about getting her memory back. It was more of a passive thing that often crossed her mind when she seemed to remember something that she hadn't done within her time at Harumachi. Some thoughts and memories felt out of place, like they weren't her own, though It didn't bother her any more, she did think about them and try to make sense of them like reading a story but she didn't let them lie on her conscience.

Maybe that was what Chie Murasaki meant by letting it take its course and not stressing herself out about it.

Seven and a half months had passed since she had arrived in Harumachi, and today she and Yuuga were out on a job not from a villager, but from Granny Chie herself. They didn't know why, but she had specifically asked the two of them to head up to the meadows and bring back the wood of the 'Royal empress tree'. She didn't give a reason but she made it quite clear that the wood must be in good condition, cut into large logs and not damaged. The two agreed and headed off to the meadow.

"You do realise that Granny probably won't pay us for this, don't you?" Yuu asked Kimi as they left the village.

"Uhm. Probably not." Kimi shrugged while securing her wood carrying box tighter over her shoulders. "But I don't mind, I like Granny Chie, though I wont say no to her buying us lunch or something" she giggled.

She had quite the savings account already, and she had stopped stuffing herself on cakes less recently too, realising that she needed to get fit, even with all the walking and exercise she had, junk food did her no good but if Granny was paying then she would accept, she very rarely treated anyone to anything.

Yuu, being the more intelligent of the two, had decided before leaving to borrow Mr. Kusuri's book of wild life and nature, and searching for the tree in question so they knew what to look for. Of course Kimi had then realised that she had no idea what this thing would look like. _**Duh, stupid.**_

They easily found it around the edge of the meadow forest and Kimi got to work chopping the wood.

"Ok, we're here. This big one right in front." Yuu pointed out as they arrived, comparing it with the one in the book. It was far bigger than the first tree Kimi had ever climbed back in the food orchard, this one had to be at least 50 foot, with bright lilac flowers blooming all the way up as far as the eye could see.

Kimi grinned. "Perfect, just what I need." She said, stretching her legs as a warm up. She took off the wood carrying thing and dropped it next to Yuu, and tightened the tool belt around her waist.

"Be careful, last time you did this you lost your footing and-"

"Don't remind me, please, that was humiliating. There's no one around to see me fall this time. Here I go."

"I'll time you!"

Kimi bounced up and down on the spot for a moment, crouched down low and then shot off in a burst of speed, Yuu watched as the pressure of her feet leaving the spot she stood on pushed into the ground, leaving a small crater and ring of dust in the air.

Within seconds Kimi was up the tree, first branch, tenth branch, thirtieth branch without using her hands even once, she watched out over the meadow as she ran higher, seeing Yuu's little dark dot get smaller and smaller and then she broke the tree tops.

She balanced easily on a thin branch that was protruding at the top and saw Yuu running further back so she could get a better view of the top.

"Kiiiimmmiii! You did it! Twenty three seconds!" She bellowed ecstatically, bouncing up and down.

"Woop! Told you didn't I!" Kimi cheered back down to her, then speaking to herself in normal tones "But twenty three seconds isn't fast enough. I haven't spent nearly eight months running, climbing and training this spiritual energy stuff for nothing. I need to get faster, I need to beat that soul reaper!" she stood there for a minute, looking over the landscape. The view from up here was amazing. She loved being high up, especially with how it was quiet up here, she could even speak to herself without getting funny looks from people, or feeling like she would be overheard, that was one reason she liked training, she had time to gather her thoughts.

She stood there for a moment. Closing her eyes, feeling the wind blowing around her, making her hair flow like long ribbons behind her. She felt like she was flying even though she was stood up straight. It felt like she was on top of the world, the highest person for miles around.

But unfortunately Yuu broke her moment of peace. "Kiiiiiiimiiiiii, Come back down!"

She sighed, wanting to spend more time up here in her peaceful meditation state.

"Right. Now back to the job at hand I suppose." and she jumped back down the tree to the lower branches, taking it easy not to fall on the way down, going up was easy, but on the way down gravity always seemed to be against her.

She safely made it down the the lower branch, watching her steps as she descended, and chopped off a few large branches, only chopping them in half instead of into smaller logs. Chie had asked specifically for large, whole pieces of wood so they couldn't really carry much.

They fastened the large logs to the carrying thing tightly and made their way back at a steady pace.

Upon entering the village she spotted a small crowd out of the corner of her eye and pulled Yuu over to see what all the fuss was about. In the middle of the crowd were two women, both a lot older than Kimi, wearing black robes with swords sheathed neatly away at their sides.

They both looked somewhat bored at the situation, like they were both used to this unwanted attention and would like nothing more than to leave the town immediately.

Kimi didn't like that sort of soul reaper, the unkind and snobby ones. Some of them just weren't very friendly but some were down right rude. Once Kimi finally found a soul reaper in town after discovering her spiritual energy, they looked at her as though she was some sort of vile insect on the floor and walked away from her. At first she was really upset and surprised but she quickly learned that some soul reapers had a superiority complex when around the Rukon Districts, as though everyone who wasn't a soul reaper was inferior. But she had learnt her lesson. She now knew that the ones who stood around doing nothing and looking bored were the ones not to make conversation with, but the ones wandering around playing with the children, helping the villagers and talking to people were fine.

She had spent a lot of time over these months reading in the local library and had unearthed a lot of interesting information. She had read more on how the soul society was split in districts, Harumachi was actually listed in that book as one of the most wealthy, pleasant and in demand villages to live in, ever expanding due to popularity; which was true, she had noticed homes springing up all over the place and the village seemed to be moving outwards quickly.

She had also found out more about social ranks and families. Shockingly enough the Murasaki's were listed as a noble family under the branch family section, but they were low ranked. By branch family it meant that they were a smaller, less important branch of one of the four noble families, which had dwindled through the bloodlines over a long period of time. Maybe that was the reason that some outsiders knew of her family, especially older people.

She had wondered about her family's connection to the nobles a few times but she couldn't get access to family trees at the local library.

_**I wonder what its like to be a direct descendant of a noble family... not a small branch.. **_she pondered while reading about the four great noble families and slightly lower ranked noble families. **_The Kuchiki's and Shihoin's... They sound almost like royalty._** The book indeed depicted the lives of these two families to be very important, powerful, influential and to have very luxurious life styles.

A child's screaming cry bought Kimi crashing out of her mind's pondering's. She whirled around to find the source of the commotion, and sure enough the two soul reapers were sitting talking to each other completely ignoring the world around them.

"Who was that?" Yuu asked, looking anxiously for the voice too.

_**I heard it from my right ear.. so it was that way!**_ "Yuu I'll be back in a minute k? Look after these for me would ya" and she dropped down the piles of wood she had been carrying on her back and ran off around the corner in the direction of the cry.

She stopped at the wooden bridge across Ryuutaki river and whirled around again. Next to the river were four teenage boys that she didn't recognise holding a little girl by her ponytails above the river. They laughed cruelly as they took something from her and dropped her into the water.

Kimi gasped and ran forward at them, grinding a halt and kicking the biggest one that had held her square in the back. He flew sideways along the dirt path and landed roughly with a thud a few meters away. His 'friends' rushed to his side to help him up and Kimi took that time to jump into the river and help the girl out.

She was flailing around like a fish on land, unable to swim.

"Calm down, I've got you!" She said reaching out. The water was up to her chest but the girl couldn't touch the floor so she panicked more. She waded back to the edge with the whaling girl on her shoulders, hopped out and placed her down on a low fence post to the side of them.

"What did they take from you?" she asked kindly, ringing out her own shirt.

"M-my sweets a-a-and my money" she whimpered between violent sobs and hiccups. Suddenly Kimi felt furious. She felt like she was burning with rage. She turned to them while they were still grovelling on the ground.

"Bro? Bro you gotta get up!"

"Don't let some girl hurt you Bro"

"C'mon Boss" the other three were saying to their fallen comrade, evidently the leader of their little gang. The boy got up off the ground and wiped the cut on his lip from where he landed.

"What low life scum would do such a thing to an innocent little girl, just for sweets and a small amount of money?" There were a few meters between them, so she stood her ground with her arms folded.

The four didn't answer but just laughed wildly.

"I don't see the humour in the this. Maybe you'd like to explain?" she said, completely calm and straight faced.

"It's just funny" the leader pipped up, after his giggles had finished. "How a little girl like you has the guts to stand up to us"

"Yeah what can you do?"

"You should just mind your own business"

"You'd be surprised what a 'Little girl' like me can be capable of. I'm not gonna walk by and watch some over grown runts like you bully a child. There was no need for you to go as far as you did!" They laughed again.

"I'd like to see you stop us"

"Try me" they didn't hesitate. The leader stepped forward first, sauntering over to Kimi with a cocky swagger and picking her up by the collar of her shirt. "Not so tough now are y- OW-" Kimi had drew her head back and dropped the nut on the bridge of nose, knocking him cleanly unconscious. Blood trickled down his face as he lay there.

She hadn't realise how high up he had held her and almost tripped as she landed on the floor.

"Boss! No! You little bitch! You'll regret that!" another one said.

Kimi smirked as she rubbed the thumping spot where their heads had connected. The other three rushed forwards.

She landed a punch in the first ones stomach, winding him and making him splutter, he wobbled around holding his gut with both hands as she elbowed him in the side out of her way.

The next one came running forward with his fist drew back high. She ducked as he went to hit her, rose back up from the floor and held his arm firmly across her shoulder. She whirled around to the left a couple of times, dragging him along with her then released when she had picked up speed, sending him flying in the river bank head first. The last one tried a sneak attack but Kimi knew he was coming, she had spotted him out of the corner of her eye but she was the perfect height to kick him where it hurts. She drew her right leg back and horse kicked him in his lower regions with such force that he was sent back into the fence that the little girl had been watching from, making it crumple under his weight.

She stood ready for a moment, waiting for one of them to get back up and have another try, but one was unconscious and the other three were concentrating too much on their injuries to even look at her. She wandered over to the unconscious boss and took a hand full of small black coins and a bag of rainbow drop sweets from his pocket.

"Hey you-" the one in the water called as he surfaced, a thumping red mark on his head from where he hit the riverbank. She didn't answer but shot a sharp ice cold glare at him. He recoiled as though her eyes had pierced him with fear.

"I suggest you pick up your friends and get out of here" she said quietly as the second one helped up the guy she had kicked in the nuts.

"Who the hell are you? Are you a soul reaper?" he asked, still in shock.

"A Soul Reaper? Hardly. My name is Kimiko Murasaki, Second Daughter of the leader of Harumachi. Don't forget it." she paused again as they seemed like they wanted to try again. She glared again, staring directly into the second one's eyes. "Need I repeat myself? Get out of here, NOW"

They rushed to pick up their unconscious boss, supporting him over their shoulders and rushed away over the bridge and out of the village without another word.

"And good riddance."

She sighed. Her heart was pounding against her ribs like it was trying desperately to break free. She had really thought she was in trouble then but she couldn't help it, she was so angry and the anger made her challenge the boys without thinking. The little girl was just behind her, still sobbing lightly. Kimi walked over to the her and gave back her sweets and money.

"Thank you so much Miss Murasaki" she said, hugging her around the waist and still sobbing lightly.

Kimi's harsh tone completely disappeared and was replaced with her usually calm and kind tone. "It was no problem at all. If you have problems with bullies again you know where to find me right?" she nodded and finally smiled. "What's your name?"

"I'm Ami!"

"Well Ami you should really get home and tell your parents what happened, go and rest" she nodded again and rushed off back in the direction Kimi had came from.

Kimi began to stroll off in the same direction, but stopped again when a slow applause came from above her. She turned, waiting for more trouble but to her delight she saw a familiar face. A tall man with raven hair and green eyes, wearing soul reaper robes with a badge wrapped around the top of his left arm and sheathed sword at his side stood on the roof of the house next to her, grinning broadly and clapping his hands.

"It's you!" she said surprised.

"Yep, long time no see Kid" he said jumping down from the roof and landing besides her. "Wanna get some coffee with me?"

_**What an odd question **_"Umm, sure why not." they walked together back into the town to the café that was next door to the bakery. Kimi wasn't a fan of coffee so she ordered pineapple juice instead.

"How long were you watching for?" she asked, slightly embarrassed.

"I see you haven't learnt to sense spiritual pressure yet. I was there from the beginning, we arrived at the same time. I heard a scream and came to investigate but when I saw you I wanted to see what would happen."

"Aww gee thanks, I could'a got creamed by those guys"

He shook his head. "Nah I doubt that, they didn't know what hit em! You did well. You've improved a lot since the first time we met."

"You think so?" she blinked, not expecting such a compliment.

"Sure do. Last time you knew nothing about anything. My little bit of advice helped did it?"

"Yeah! It helped a lot, I can control my spirit energy pretty well now"

"So I saw, you made those heavy hits by focusing your spiritual energy to one single point of contact. Very smart, I like your style"

"That's the only thing I can do... That was my first time fighting though.. I've never even thrown a punch before, I was relying completely on my spirit energy there. Other than that I can run really fast if I send it to my feet."

"Well for eight months of practising without even being a soul reaper or having proper formal training that's quite an achievement, you should be proud of yourself."

Kimi smiled happily. "Do you think I'm good enough to become a Soul Reaper yet?"

He shook his head matter of factly and Kimi felt like dropping her head on the table.

"Damn you, You had my hopes up for a sec there"

"There a lot more to being a soul reaper than wearing a uniform and knowing how to control your spirit energy. You should keep on practising, especially on your combat skills and even swordsmanship if you get chance. Keep trying and one day you'll get into the soul reaper academy, I promise you that"

She smiled again. "I'll try!"

She sat for a moment, remembering the first time they met.

It was a few months after arriving in Harumachi.

Kimi had the distinct feeling that karma was out to get her. The soul reapers were everywhere when you didn't know who the hell they were or what the hell they were doing here, but when you needed one they seemed extinct.

Since Yuu had explained what spiritual energy was to the extent of her knowledge Kimi had been extremely eager to train, but she didn't really know what to do or where to start. Trying to make herself glow like a light bulb was the only thing she could think of, but apart from that she had no clue.

So she plucked up the courage to get her ass out of the manor and find a soul reaper, though of course she couldn't find one anywhere.

Eventually she resigned to fate and made her way back home through the woods, in a thoroughly bad mood.

"Hey, Kid. You shouldn't be walking around here on your own, did no-one teach you that the woods are dangerous" a voice called from fairly far behind her.

She whirled around to see a soul reaper. Karma had not cursed her after all.

"You're a soul reaper!" she shouted, pointing at him.

He raised an eyebrow "No shit, what gave it away?"

Kimi shook her head, she really did sound like an idiot, stating the obvious like that.

"Can I ask you a favour?"

"I guess so, what do you need?"

"I want to become a soul reaper-"

"Whoa not so fast kid, not just anyone can become a soul reaper, there's a bunch of things you need to have before you-"

"I have spiritual energy if that's what your talking about" he lifted an eyebrow again, not believing her.

"Walk with me kid, we can't stand here like fools all day" he walked past her with his arms rested behind his head like a pillow, thankfully heading in the same route to the village that Kimi had been taking.

"I'm not lieing, I do have spiritual energy!" and at the most perfect timing her belly gave a loud angry grumble, as if to back up her argument.

He raised an eyebrow again. "Ok, so your hungry? When did you last eat?"

"This morning, I kinda rushed out of the house without food because I was looking for a soul reaper to talk to, but you are the only person I've seen all day"

He nodded. "We'll grab something to eat in the village, I'm heading into Harumachi"

"Me too, I live there. I was just gonna give up my search for soul reapers and head home" she smiled.

"I guess I had good timing then" he smiled down to her in reply.

They reached the village in silence, except for angry noises from Kimi's belly, in ten minutes or so and stopped at the main café in the town square. Kimi was delighted when the soul reaper came out of the café with a baguette and a carton of raspberry juice for her, though it didn't last long.

"Whoa, slow kid, I know your hungry but your gonna choke if you eat like that, I don't wanna be responsible for your death"

"Noe urries, I ont khoke" she mumbled, barely understandable. When she finished she realised that the man had been watching her. She blushed, wondering if she had done something wrong. "...What's up?"

"I was trying to sense your spiritual pressure but its very faint. There, but faint. If you train more it will increase though"

"Yeah that's the problem, I know I need to train but I don't know where to start, I don't really know anything about soul reapers either"

"Well first lets start with what you do already know" he suggested, sitting back in his seat with his coffee.

"Well, I know that we have spiritual energy, and I know that people with spiritual energy are the only ones who get hungry, and I know I can make myself light up with a white aura... but apart from that I don't really understand anything else"

"Well it's a start I guess. Spiritual energy is power that is stored inside a person, you are correct, the way to recognise the fact if you have spiritual energy is usually by getting hungry but other can discover it through accidents and so on, so fourth"

"I discovered it by accident, nearly killing myself from 20 feet up" Kimi grumbled. The man blinked again and continued.

"It can be used for all sorts of things but the main uses are for combat, speed and healing. Of course you would need soul reaper training for that sort of stuff, but before that you will need basic training just to increase your overall amount of spirit energy and learn to control it more, so that it doesn't leak and stuff"

Kimi had an odd image of white fog leaking out of her person while walking down the street but she literally smacked the image out of her mind with her hand, causing more funny looks from people around her.

"So the basic training to begin with would be?"

"Most kids of the Rukon come across it by accident, as you may know most places in the Rukon are dangerous places to live, so most kids use their spirit energy to protect themselves, learning to fight"

"I'm not much of a fighter, I'm not a violent person" Kimi fidgeted.

The man rubbed his hands through his hair, thinking. "This area is relatively safe, though learning combat would be useful especially if you want to become a soul reaper, its an essential skill for a soul reaper, you should consider it"

Kimi fidgeted more, not wanting to fight.

He sighed. "Well maybe you should train to just control it. Like making a sphere of energy in your hand and keeping it there for as long as possible, stuff like that"

"That sounds easy enough, I can already make myself glow so I can definitely do that" she paused for a while. "What about that speed that you mentioned?"

"Oh that's simple enough too, you can just use your energy to run faster, jump higher and etc."

"I already thought I may be able to do that but I didn't know for sure so I haven't tried"

"You should try anything you think of, even if you were wrong it was worth a try. You don't know if you don't try, right?"

"Right" she nodded.

The man then agreed to show her how to run faster. He took her to an area just outside of town and showed her what to do.

She then tried herself a few times.

"This is difficult... I'll never run as fast as you, you were like a bolt of lightning, really hard to focus on even..."

"Practise makes perfect kid, you cant be good at it instantly. Be persistent and you'll get it."

"I guess so. I want to become a soul reaper so I'll keep going"

The man paused to think again. "Say, didn't you say you don't really know anything about soul reapers? Why do you want to become one so bad?"

"It's a long story..."

"I've got all day." He smiled, sitting on the dusty ground with his legs crossed as though to finalize his decision.

"They saved me" she said simply. "Soul reapers saved me from being devoured by a monster in the world of the living when I was a ghost"

His eyes widened. "You were about to be eaten by a hollow weren't you?" he asked quietly.

Kimi just nodded, a tear sparkling in the corner of her eye. "I don't know how I died, I lost my memory when I got here you see, so I only know little clips of things that have come back to me over the last two months or so. I remember being chased by this massive monster with a white face, I was about to be eaten and three people came to save me... a man and two girls. All I have ever wanted since I remembered that was to thank them, give something back to them and help others like they helped me..."

The man stared at her, she couldn't see him. She was looking directly at him but past him, as if he wasn't there and she was seeing something he couldn't.

He smiled, stood up and put a hand on her head. "Then that gives you even more reason to practise hard and become good enough to go to the soul reaper academy."

She cut out of her trance instantly "There's an academy? A school for soul reapers"

"damn right, It teaches kids like you everything there is to know about being a soul reaper, and after you graduate you get into one of 13 court guard squads and get a uniform like me" he said, tugging at his own collar proudly.

Kimi mouth was gaping open. "I wanna join now! And I want a cool arm badge and a sword too"

the man howled with laughter. "You kids are so impressionable. The badge is for more... advanced soul reapers, and you'll get a sword too soon after you enter the academy but these swords are way too complicated for me to explain to you at the moment, you'd never understand them"

"I got all day" Kimi mimicked, crossing her legs.

"Not today. If you train hard and we meet again some time then I'll explain it to you, I might even show you the swords secret" he winked.

"Aww, your leaving?" Kimi asked, slightly down. She was enjoying the man's company, he was by far the most friendly soul reaper she had met yet.

"I've gotta, I've got a job to do, I'm not supposed to be spending time chatting to kids like you." He stood up and turned to leave.

"If I get faster and strong by the time you come again will you race me?" Kimi asked him quickly.

"We'll see, Good luck Kiddo" and the man disappeared into thin air.

"Fast! Where did he-" she stared around, looking up into the air and all around her but he was nowhere to be seen. "I gotta learn how to do that!"

She gripped her glass of juice tightly, wanting to ask him something but hesitating, but the words spilled out without really thinking.

"Will you race with me?" she blurted out, realising how childish it sounded. She had an odd talent for making strange statements and making perfectly normal things sound stupid.

He blinked while sipping his coffee. "You wanna race me?"

She nodded quickly "Remember? You promised you would if I got stronger, I wanna see how fast I am compared to you!"

He stared at her for a second and then downed the rest of his coffee in one gulp. "Challenge accepted Kid!"

"The name's Kimiko!"

"Right, Kimiko then. Where to?"

"Hmmm. Through the village, to the end of the road by the orchard and back here?"

"Sounds good to me, but don't be upset when you lose to me, 'kay?"

Kimi smirked. She was confident in her ability, she knew she was fast enough. They both got into position. Kimi crouching down low. She felt that she would get further quicker with a good push off. The soul reaper simply stood there with his arms raised slightly. "Readdyy.. GO!"

They both shot off like bullets from a gun, both at equal speeds, Kimi easily keeping up with her raven haired friend. Instead of dodging past villagers in the streets as Kimi did, he jump up on top of the buildings and ran across roofs. Kimi looked up at him realising that he was slightly ahead and was gaining an advantage.

He grinned down at her then seemingly disappeared by leaping forward. Kimi almost ran into someone as she looked around for him.

_**This has to be some sort of trick to throw me off, keep moving **_she thought, apologising to the woman and moving on. Sure enough when she reached the checkpoint at the orchard he was standing there impatiently tapping his foot.

"C'mon, Your not gonna win like that-"

"How the hell did you do that?"

"Win me and I'll tell you"

"Your on!" again they took off to meet back where they started. _**I don't know if he will do that thing again but if he does I'll lose... the only way is to take a short cut. **_By this time she knew her way around the village with her eyes closed, they ran along the main road together and where he went straight onwards into the town Kimi took a right through side streets and over fences.

_**Left, right, forwards, jump over that house, left again, over the fence, almost there... **_the café was in sight but he wasn't.. she skidded to a halt outside and looked around.

"You took your time" came an amused voice from the shop door. He sat back down in his previous seat out the shop and sipped on his second coffee.

Kimi was baffled. "How... I even took short cuts, how did you do that!?"

"I told you I would tell you if you win, but you didn't, you just gotta try harder"

"How can I try harder if I don't know what to do? Please... Tell me so I can get better" he looked up at her while still drinking. Kimi glared at him in a pleading sort of way, she was determined for him to understand how badly she wanted to get better.

"I like your determination kid, persistence is the key to success. I guess I'll tell ya. _That _was a flash step"

"Flash step? When you disappeared?"

"Yeah. Flash step as the name implies, is a large step taken at such speed that it looks like you appear and disappear in flashes as you land. They are just jumps, or steps that are taken very quickly, but they take some practise. You can feel a bit disorientated after them when your new to it"

Kimi absorbed the information like a sponge. She bowed to him. "Thank you, I promise I'll practise it and next time we meet I'll be faster than you"

"Woah thats quite a statement kid, you sure your up to it?"

"Of course I am! Pinkie?" he smiled and held out his pinkie finger to hers. There was a shout from behind Kimi as more black robed men ran up to them.

"Lieutenant! We've been looking for you everywhere, where were you?" he looked down at Kimi.

"Just helping a friend of mine"

"Sir we don't have time to be playing with kids, we have a job to do"

"Yes yes I know, I thought I was entitled to a break occasionally." he grumbled gulping down the last of his drink. He left the cup on the table and put a hand on Kimi's head, ruffling her hair slightly. "I wish you all the best kiddo, I look forward to seeing you graduate from the soul reaper academy. See ya around sometime" and he walked away, following the other men.

"Wait!" she called after him, he looked over his shoulder while walking "What's your name?"

"The names Kaien, Kaien Shiba" and with that he left.

"Kaien huh..?" she bowed low. She knew he couldn't see her but she felt completely in debt to him, He was a stranger and yet even though they had only met twice his little time and advice had helped her so much. "I'm grateful Kaien, thank you"

* * *

Finally, something to do with bleach!

I didn't know what to call the wood carrying thingy, but I first saw it in Nagasarete Airantou when Ikuto and Suzu were carrying the firewood on their backs, so I just called it what it looked like xD

And the Royal empress tree is actually a real tree, it looks a bit like a cherry blossom from a distance but the flowers looks different, like they're closed or dropping, it's pretty :3

Hope you enjoyed, leave a review please! .


	7. Under the Cover of Darkness

Finally, the real story is about to start.

I don;t own bleach~ Haven't said it for a while so thought i'd remind you T.T

* * *

Chapter 7 – Under the cover of Darkness

Kimi tossed and turned for what felt like hours that night, and the next night, and the night after that... One minute she was staring at the blank far wall of her room as moonlight hit her face, and the next the sun was replacing it.

She couldn't stop thinking of the things that had happened to her here so far no matter what method of falling to sleep she tried.

One thing that kept her mind racing was that Soul Reaper, Kaien. It had now been a few days since he had vanished from the village for a second time and Kimi wondered how long it would be before he returned. **A few months again? A year? Longer perhaps? **There were so many things that she wanted to ask when he was gone, but when he was there she was put on the spot and couldn't think of them, and now here she was, struggling to sleep due to her clogged up brain.

**You won't disappear so easily next time, Kaien!** She thought savagely. He had promised to train with her and show her what was so special about those swords the soul reapers carried around, but again he had gone as quickly as he had appeared.

Kimi felt her eyes close heavily for a moment and she finally felt as though she was drifting off into dream land, that is until there was a loud yell out side of her room.=

Her brow twitched as the yelling and loud talking continued. She buried her head underneath her pillow, but that only made it sound like a swarm of angry bees buzzing around her room.

"Oh for crying out loud" she whined loudly, her voice cracking slightly. "Just when I was finally tired!" she flew up out of her bed and stomped over to her door. Surprisingly, she found that there was no one out side of the room, but when she listened more carefully she released that the sound was coming from the road outside of the manor, which was conveniently only a few meters from her paper-thin walls.

Usually the road was quiet, barely noticeable even. It was the road that she and Yuu took into the village and it was one of two ways to leave or enter by horse and carriage. Kimi did occasionally hear the faint clip-clop of horse hoofs as travellers and tradesmen passed by which she didn't mind at all, but this ruckus was ridiculous.

A breeze of cold November air floated down her back, making her shiver so she retreated back into the warmth of her room. The noise didn't quiet down any so she decided to go investigate.

She splashed some water on her face, combed her hair and threw on some clothes:

A long red woolly jumper that was far too big for her, it reached down to her thighs, that was made for her by a woman in the village as a thank you for helping with job. Thick black woolly tights, black pumps, and a black gloves and scarf set that once belonged to Yuu but Kimi conveniently forgot to return them after borrowing them, Yuu seemed not to have noticed or cared so it was fine.

It seemed pointless to stay quiet when leaving her room as she usually would have this early of the morning. Anyone who heard the noise had no chance of sleeping through it, so she left her room and closed the door normally, rather than trying to be silent.

Her garden looked very different at this time of year. Usually the ground and her little pond would be covered with cherry blossom petals, but now what few petals were left were a pale white. The trees branches were covered with frost and the pond was coated with a thin sheet of Ice. Frost also lay on the floor, with patches of ice lying invisibly waiting for some unsuspecting victim to step on and break their neck.

**That'll be me **Kimi thought, _Only I would be unlucky enough to go flying on black ice. I think I'll take the safe route._

The sun was only just beginning to rise. The sky was a pale orange in the east and dark everywhere else. Soon enough the sun would rise and make most of the ice melt away, part of her roof was bathing in the low light so she decided to run there where it would be less lethal.

She jumped from the roof onto the wall that divided the manor and the road and looked both ways for the source of the disturbance. Sure enough just a few meters to the left past her bedroom was a large group of people huddled together.

She raised an eyebrow and ran along the wall to go and see what all the fuss was about, hopping down to join the back of the crowd just before the wall ended.

"What's going here?" but her question was ignored. The mumbling was too loud to hear her especially all the way from the back to the front. She tried asking politely a few more times but eventually gave up and just barged her way through to the front.

She was atleast a foot shorter than everyone else, and it was a good job she wasn't claustrophobic else she would be panicking right about now. She swam through the crowd, stepping on toes as she went and feeling slightly crushed and pushed around. "Excuse me, coming through, whoops sorry" she finally reached the front and fell out of the front line of people, bumping into someone and regaining her balance instead of falling flat on her face.

Looking up she realised that they were wearing black. **Crap, a soul reaper! No, four soul reapers!**

"What the hell kid! Get back in line" the man she had stumbled into shouted. His comrades who were spread out in a line across the road glared at her disgustedly.

"Tsk. I _was_ going to apologize but I changed my mind" Kimi retorted, straightening up and brushing dust off her legs. "What the hell is going on here?" she demanded.

"Who the hell do you think you are? Bumping into me and asking questions" he shouted. This guy seemed like he was already aggravated, probably by all of these villagers, and he was ready for an argument.

"I'm Kimiko Murasaki! You wanna fight over this? Are you really that stupid? It was an accident and I want to know why all of these people woke me up so early, is that a difficult thing to answer?" Kimi too was getting aggravated now, her temper seemed short since those boys had given her trouble.

"Kimi" came a blunt voice from above her.

"What?" she snapped back and whirled around to face them, ready for more trouble. But to her surprise it was Shinsetsu, though he wasn't wearing his usual grin.

"Let me take this from here."

"I- Right.. I'm sorry, I was just..." she stuttered under her breath, at first trying to justify her actions but he just moved her aside gently with his arm and stepped forward.

"I'm Shinsetsu Murasaki, leader of this village and Kimiko's father. I too would like to know what is going on here, Why are you blocking this route?" he didn't shout at the soul reaper but she would have preferred it if he did. This calm but cold manner was totally different from what she was used to, his bubbly and kind self seemed to have vanished, Kimi was more scared by that than the prospect of fighting an armed soul reaper while unarmed.

The man stuttered for a moment, and then regained a professional manner. He spoke as if reciting his words for the hundredth time: "The surrounding routes in and out of all villages in districts 1-7 are closed until further notice, no citizens are to leave the village under any circumstances, anyone who is found trying to leave or are found outside of the perimeters will be arrested and taken into the custody of the 13 court guard squads."

There was an even louder mumbling from the crowd, some groans, some yells of anger.

"You can't do that to us!"

"We have crops and animals to care for out there!"

"I need to go to the other villages, I need to buy materials!"

Kimi couldn't agree more. She had worked for most of these people and she knew full well how much this village relied on the surrounding areas for fields, farms, orchards and markets. They couldn't survive without them. Maybe for one day yes, but for too long... not a chance.

"Why did you not consult the leader of the village before doing this? I should know about everything that happens in my village even if it is a matter of the 13 court guard squads. I should atleast be informed first."

Again, the man showed signs of losing his composure. He wasn't prepared for this. "We are just following orders. This is a p_rivate _matter of the 13 court guard squads and therefore there is no need for any other organisation to know what is going on. We were commanded to block off the routes in and out of all villages in this area. No one is to know the details of why."

"I disagree. I thought it was common courtesy to inform a leader if you are doing something in his village, I don't mean to ask for my permission, I mean to inform me so I can help if possible and make sure my people are safe. This is my village and I want to know why these people's daily lives are being interrupted by Soul Reapers. I need to know the situation, perhaps I can even help you. Would you please come to my office and explain in privacy?"

The crowd was totally silent now. Their glares were fixed on this one man who was now an involuntary spokesmen for the soul reapers. His colleagues looked at him, just as unsure as he was then he nodded.

"Fine. But if I get in trouble your name will be mentioned"

"That's fine by me" Shin smiled, his usual personality seemed to be shining back through, though it was probably faked. "Follow me if you will."

The man stepped forward from his line and the other soul reapers closed the gap, resuming to block the path. Kimi watched as the two of them walked past her, the crowd parting to let them pass through. Shinsetsu paused for a moment.

"I'd like for you people to return to your homes for the moment. As soon as this situation is resolved or we come to an agreement I will send news around the village, I promise" and then he continued. The villagers gapped at him angrily But he held his head up high and continued.

Kimi felt slightly sorry for the Soul Reaper, after all he was only following the orders of his superiors which he probably wasn't allowed to question, he wasn't the one calling the shots. He looked a little bit ashamed as he passed the glaring faces, or were they now glaring at Shin's back for agreeing with the Soul Reapers?

**You can't please everyone I guess, But that doesn't excuse his rudeness **Kimi thought still mad at the man for losing his temper with her.

Kimi realised she had been staring dumbly at their backs as they left. She shook away her thoughts and jogged to catch up with them both, soon having to skip and hop to keep up with their long strides.

"Is this about what I think it is?" Shin was asking the man under his breath.

"There's only one thing it can be about" the man replied. He was about to elaborate when Shin put a hand on his shoulder.

"Not here, wait until we are in my office"

"So, what's happening out there? Another robbery or something? A Murder?" Kimi asked curiously, almost conversationally.

The man was about to answer when Shin interrupted. "Please don't interfere Kimiko."

**What the... He never calls me Kimiko any more...**"Why cant I ask questions? What's wrong with asking questions?"

"This is a private matter between me and the 13 court guard squads. Private means no one else is to know"

**Translation: I'm hiding something from you, go away. **"But Shin! I might be able to help... I'm not training to become a Soul Reaper for nothing. One day I'll be doing this kind of job the same as these guys"

"And until then you should mind your own business" he snapped. Kimi looked at him, shocked. He had never once spoken to her like that, ever. Shin didn't apologize but carried on walking. When entering the manor he paused and shook his head, thinking to himself but not voicing it.

"Kimi... go and wake Yuu and tell her the news, she was due to go out of the village on a job today, it's best that she knows early."

**Translation: I'm trying to get rid of you, go away. **Kimi glared at him, not bothering to hide the fact that she was mad. "Fine." she turned on her heel and walked in the opposite direction.

**Convenient how Yuu's room is the opposite side of the manor. You won't be going to your office now, will you Shin? **She asked in her mind. She continued walking and gritted her teeth and fists, making a split second decision. **I'm not standing for this any longer. They've been hiding something from me ever since I arrived here, I want to know the truth!**

Kimi knew they were watching her out of sight so she picked up speed and stormed around the corner.

She hid there for a moment but heard foot steps approaching, sure enough Shin came to see if she was gone. She leaped up onto the roof and out of sight silently just before his head popped around the corner.

He seemed to have decided that Kimi had indeed ran to Yuu's room. He sighed and returned to the Soul Reaper man who was waiting where she had left them.

She lay low on the roof, still able to hear them without them spotting her.

"My apologies for that. Kimiko is the last person on earth I would want to hear this. I know she is mad at me so she will probably avoid me for a while, but just as a precaution we ill go to a different office." he continued walking, but not in the direction of his own office.

**I knew it! I knew I wasn't imagining it! He's going somewhere else to throw me off.**

They reached another room, Yoshino's office, Shin slid the door open and allowed the Soul Reaper to enter first. Shin paused to scan around the yard before entering. Kimi re-emerged into sight once the door had closed and sprinted to the roof above them. She lay down and hung her head over the edge again.

She could hear them as though she was in the room with them.

The Soul Reaper let out a deep, troubled sigh. "So you know what's been happening over these past few months?"

"Not exactly but rumours spread fast, we vaguely know but we don't know the details" Shin replied. "I'm disappointed that something terrible has been happening on our door step and the guard squads have had the nerve to invade our village everyday but say nothing about the situation. We don't know what is happening, where or why. We know we are in danger but we have been offered no protection"

The reaper sighed again. "I might as well put your mind at rest then, or maybe not at rest but atleast keep you in the know. I won't get in trouble for that if rumours are flying around." he paused again, seemly taking a drink of something. Shin did usually offer guests snacks and wine.

"Over these past months there have been a series of strange... disappearances, for lack of a better word. I guess they could also be called attacks or deaths. At first we thought it was nothing serious, just a coincidence that a number of people had died in the same area and in the same way in quick succession, but over the months they have become more frequent."

Kimi's eyes widened. **Deaths? Attacks?**

"You say attacks, deaths or disappearances, why are you unsure?" Shin asked.

"Because the only reason we know about this is because people have been reported missing and their clothes have been found discarded soon after. A few days ago there were more reports and we decided to go and investigate properly, so to resolve the problem before it gets out of hand and spreads. We were shocked by what we found"

Kimi listened in even harder, not wanting to miss a single word of this.

"The clothes we found were indeed discarded on the ground, but as though they were still being worn. The owners had not removed them because their shirts were still buttoned, belts tied, socks inside shoes... It's as though they had just disintegrated..."

"Then that means they died, correct?"

"No, not correct. Everything in the Soul Society is made of Reishi, particles of spirit energy that combine to create everything from the trees, to the animals, to the food to our bodies. When something dies or is destroyed it returns to its Reishi state and becomes part of the Soul Society; the same goes for people, if a person dies they turn to Reishi, but so do their items of clothing."

Kimi lay there in shock again. She remember one of the very first questions she had asked Yoshino and Shin when she had first woke up here: "What will happen to me if I die here?"

And now she knew. She would cease to exist, simply disappear into nothingness. Maybe as if she had never existed in the first place?

Once again she felt physically sick but the men continued to talk and she continued to listen in.

"That is odd. So they didn't die, and they didn't undress... so, what happened to them?" Shin asked, baffled.

"We don't know. The reason we have blocked off the villages is keep all citizens contained while an advanced unit and a squad conduct an investigation. They are out on the field looking for clues as we speak, the villagers being safe in their homes makes things easier for those teams and people needn't stumble upon anything they shouldn't witness. Anyone found outside of a village will be taken in as a suspect"

Shin sighed. "And where is this operation taking place?"

"In Fugai of district five. It's only a few mile from here but villagers of Harumachi visit there regularly"

Kimi almost gasped aloud. **Fugai? I was there only two days ago with Yuu! So close to home this whole time...**

"You should have just come to see me in the first place, we could have avoided all of this fuss. I will of course co-operate and make sure that the villagers stay at home, but in return I hope that you will do whatever you can to make this operation go as quickly and quietly as possible... The longer it takes the more anger and frustration there is, and that will only cause more trouble..."

"There's not much I can do myself sir, I've been put on guard duty only, but if there is any information I, or my colleagues find or any way we can help, we will, I assure you"

"Thank you. Now let us leave and inform the villagers of our decision. Expect a small riot" Shin chuckled. They opened the door and left down the corridor towards the main road again.

Kimi watched on in silence and anger rose up inside of her like flames.

This whole time Kimi had thought that this life was too good to be true... like it was just one big, amazingly realistic dream. But it was more like a nightmare... Kimi was nothing more that particals of spiritual energy that could vaporize into thin air at any moment, and this knowledge had been kept from her for so long.

She stared off into the distances, as though watching something at wasn't actually there.

**Shin... how could you do this... you've known for so long and yet you don't care? You know that people are dying and in danger and yet you've kept up this lie for so long, smiling and laughing as though the bigger picture isn't happening on your doorstep... do you have a conscience? How can you act so care-free? People may be in their homes but that doesn't stop a murderer from entering the village...**

Kimi was actually shaking now. She feared for her own life, for others lives.

**There has been so many opportunities, so many times where I could have been killed or seriously injured... i could have just disappead on the spot. So many time we have been alone out in the meadows or the woods, or the roads between villages... Fugai... I was at Fugai...**

A tear ran down her face.

**I thought this life was too perfect to be true! I knew that there was nowhere in the world that could be so peaceful and have no disadvantages, I've been walking around blind folded, completely unaware that at any moment I could disappear from this world without a trace...**

**Does Yuu know? Is Yuu aware that she was is danger? Does she know what would happen to her if she "Died"? Does that not scare her? ... Yuu was keeping something from me as well... Of course she knew! She was the same as Shin, stopping me from asking questions or changing the subject every time I came close to asking.**

Kimi began to properly cry. **If they really did care about me as a daughter then they would have told me, prepared me, so that I knew and had a chance of protecting myself, protecting Yuu as well... Maybe they did it on purpose.. maybe they want me dead...maybe they don't care!**

**If they cared they would have told me so I could protect myself!**

Kimi got up, shaking badly and ran over the roofs in the direction of her room.

**Enough is enough! If they don't care about me then I don't know why they pretended for so long, but I'm out of here. If the soul reapers don't want to get their asses out there and do more to save people then I'll do it for them, I haven't been training for nothing, I could have saved those people...**

She ran into her room and slammed the door shut, pacing around restlessly, still crying and feeling like she was having a panic attack. She kept attempting to settle down or sleep but had to keep moving. Running her hands through her hair, looking out of her door, moving around the room constantly.

She dreaded facing any of the family at the moment, she would probably lose her temper and rage at them, and despite them lieing to her like this she was grateful for them taking her in and giving her a roof over her head so she didn't want to cause trouble.

If she was going anywhere or leaving she was going to do it in the dead of night, without a trace, disappearing in thin air like they had probably planned for her.

**I need a plan. I need to find a way to escape here without being caught and then make my way to Fugai without being seen.**

She picked up a pen and some paper out of her desk and sat there, formulating her ideas onto paper. This made her calm down slightly, it gave her something to focus on and vent her anger on, and it was crucial that she got this right.

She finished making her plan and editing it several times and lay back on her bed. She was finally relatively calm now that she knew what she was going to do.

Her belly gave an unexpected yowl.

**Ugh I haven't eaten yet and no chance am I going to go and make food, that would mean bumping into people. If I bump into the, there's a chance i'll lose my temper here're in any escape plans... I'll just have to do without.**

She checked her clock. It was only half past eight... **Still around 7 hours til sunset... 7 hours of waiting. I'm not going to get away with not speaking to anyone for long. I'll lie here and pretend to sleep.**

Kimi had been exactly right. At about ten o'clock Yuu knocked her door. Luckily enough Kimi was already lieing in her bed, so she rolled over towards the wall and pretended to sleep. Yuu entered quietly but left when she released that Kimi was asleep.

She came back again at about one o'clock that afternoon, knocked again and entered after a moment. Kimi was still lieing there, deep in thought.

"Kimi?" Yuu asked quietly.

"Uhm?"

"Do you not want food? You haven't eaten yet"

"I'm not hungry" she said bluntly, hoping that her belly wouldn't betray her.

"Aww c'mon, your always hungry!" Yuu giggled. "I know we can't really leave here but can't sleep all day, why don't you get up, I can help you train in the yard if you like?"

"I-I don't want to today, not feeling well." She rushed again, still not turning to Yuu.

"But It's so boring around here, please get up, we can find something to-"

"No Yuu, I don't want to." she snapped back. Yuu fell silent.

"Ok. I'm sorry for disturbing you. Maybe I'll see you at dinner if your feel better, it's at six as usual" and she left, closing the door behind her.

**I'll be long gone before six, Yuu.**

Kimi didn't really care that she had snapped at her. It was about time that she lost her temper with these people. She was leaving anyway, it would be easier to leave if they were in a bad mood with her.

Kimi fell asleep, and before she knew it nightfall came. A lantern being lit somewhere outside of her room was what woke her up. She stretched and got up out of bed.

She put her shoes back on and replaced her red jumper with an identical black one. She also wore a black woolly hat with her hair down and wrapped her scarf around her face like a mask. Now the only parts of skin that were visible were her pale cheeks.

She checked herself over in the mirror and knew instantly that it would be almost impossible to see her in this outfit as long as she stayed in the shadows.

She walked over to her light and took one last look at the room. Considering she had only been here about seven months and the room wasn't exactly crowded with belongings, but it felt like home and she would miss the place. Even if she had any way of carry things she couldn't think of anything she wanted to take with her, it would be better to travel light for speed anyway.

A tear welled up in the corner of her eye as she turned the light off. "Goodbye room" she smiled, and slipped out of her room closing the door behind her gently.

She rushed around the corner of the building and into the shadows, away from the lantern light before anyone caught sight of her.

"Whoa" she muttered as she stumbled into pitch blackness and suddenly felt blind. She leaned her back against a wall for a few moments to allow her eyes to adjust before continuing.

She came to the end of an alley way between the wall surrounding the manor and one of the buildings. Just ahead of her to the left was a small gate that lead to a path around the outside of the manor wall and out onto the main road, but the last thing she wanted to do was go near the road, she would probably walk right into a soul reaper guard if she did and that would mean being caught and punished.

She could see through the gate's iron bars that the path was bathed in the golden light of a lantern, which probably meant that someone had recently patrolled that area.

She gulped, rushed forward and lay flat against the wall next to the gate, checked down the path and saw no one, then quickly leaped up and over the wall, rather than opening the creaky iron gate, and ran into the dense forest next to the path.

Seconds later, a black robed woman strolled around the corner and peered down the path as if searching for someone. Kimi dropped to the floor and lay low under the bushes, her heart mimicking her and dropping into her stomach.

_**Did she see me?**_

Though it seemed to have been a co-incidence. The woman stared around, gripping the handle of the sword at her waist tightly. She did not speak, just looked around, and then seemed to decide she was imagining things, turning around and back onto the main road.

Kimi sighed her relief and rose into a crouching position.

_**The road to Fugai is to the east, at the other side of the village.. So I need to pass through or past the village and follow the main road out to the other end... My plan seemed fine in theory but now... I'm not so sure..**_

She quickly made her decision and set off again. She sprinted as quickly and light footedly as she could along the back manor wall,making her way into the village but keeping to the shadows. She ran into an alley way between two houses and peered into the village centre. Sure enough as she had guessed, it was crowded with soul reapers, all spread out around the town, standing silently as if waiting for something to happen. Kimi retreated back into the shadows and continued to ran behind the houses.

She soon came to the little bridge over the river where she had saved little Ami from the bullies last week and paused to smile at the place. She vividly remembered how she felt at that moment, how rage boiled up like flames inside of her, and the odd feeling of enjoyment at hitting someone for the first time... Was that a bad feeling? Was that wrong, or was it normal?

She smirked and then realised she wasn't exactly in the dark, she could quite easily be spotted here, and leaped up into a high tree above the river and jumped from branch to branch in the direction of the main road.

She saw the road in the distance through the trees, faintly lit by lanterns which were probably held by soul reapers.

_**I'll follow the path but from up here, I'll be seen on the grou- **_Kimi let out a sudden loud, high pitched yelp as her foot got caught on a twisted branch and she plummeted towards the ground. Her lapse of concentration had caused her to miss place her foot and fall from the tree.

She hit the ground with a resounding thud and another yelp, which seemed to have alerted people to her presence.

She heard them in the distance as pulled herself up from the floor.

"What was that?"

"I don't know, I'm sure I heard a scream"

"I think it was this way, come on lets check it out"

"Shit, I need to get out of here or I'll be found" she muttered, wincing at the pain in her hip and beginning to run again.

"Over there! Movement at 1 O'clock!" a young man shouted, more people were approaching having heard the racket as well.

"Shit, shit, shit!" Kimi ignored the pain and practically threw herself into a panicked sprint.

They were slowly gaining on her, she kept turning to look at them, seeing glints of shiny metal in the moonlight... Unsheathed swords.

She knew now that she was literally running for her life,weaving in and out of trees, jumping between high and low branches.

She remembered the fact that here, she was made of spirit particles... _**Doesn't that basically mean I AM like my own spiritual energy? Maybe I AM the energy! **_In a desperate attempt to run faster she began to send her spiritual energy around her body, using more and more of it with every single foot step and bend of her knee. Just as Kaien explained, this meant made the point of impact stronger, so that she was now launching into the air with every single frantic foot step.

She then sped up for a second time, but regretted it. She hadn't realised how far she had ran in just a few minutes but she was now approaching the waterfall and basin at the edge of the district.

She was running far too fast now to step or change course, all she could do was hope that she could clear the huge leap across the basin to the other side of the forest.

She clenched her fisted, closed her eyes for a moment, bent her knees into a crouch for a split millisecond and launched high into the air far above the shimmering water.

The soul reaper crash to a halt at the edge of the trees and stared on almost in awe as Kimi cleared the gap and landed safely on a high tree branch at the other side.

She had opened her eyes as she felt like her jump was ending and saw the approaching branch, landing neatly on it and continuing to run. She checked back behind her and saw that the reapers had stopped following and saw them spread out onto separate far branches at the river bank, watching her back as she left.

She continued to run, so far that it seemed as though she was vanishing and reappearing between steps...

"Flash Step!" She suddenly shouted. !It's just as Kaien said!" She grinned and laughed ecstatically as she realised she had achieved her goal of learning to Flash step.

"I did it... I DID IT!"

This was another strange feeling, this time of excitement and adrenaline. The excitement of running for her life and winning the race, the soft moonlight shining down on her, the bitterly freezing winter wind biting at her bare face and blowing her loose hair back, It was exhilarating. She had never felt like this in her life but she knew that she loved every second of it.

"Bring it on Kaien! If I can win them I can win you too!" she cheered, feeling more confident in her own abilities than she had ever done before.

In no time at all she had reached the top of the highest hill in the district. She walked along a cliff side that over looked the village at a distance and peered down at it.

Lights were flickering into existence all over the place. It seemed that people had been woken by her escape and no doubt news would be spreading around the village any moment now. But the chances of them finding her were now rather slim. She was far out of town and even if someone spotted her they didn't stand a chance at catching her.

She jumped up into a tree and sat against the trunk to catch her breath.

She smiled as she made out a few of the buildings in the village.

There was the manor, and there was the tailors shop, that next door would be the physician's and there was what looked like.. "The bakery... I should have grabbed some food before leaving, i'm starving..."she mouthed as her belly gave a loud, unhappy rumble.

Her smile disappeared. She would miss this village and its lifestyle. She would miss her family, the jobs she went on to earn money, the amazing food from the bakery, the time she spent with Yuu... She memories she had made there. She would cherish those memories forever even after what they had done to her. They were her first and only memories and she couldn't forget them just they meant nothing.

"So much has happened over these months, I've left behind a life I don't remember and began to live a new one... I'm so grateful to everyone one in the village..." a tear ran down the bridge of her nose. "But can't be certain that I wasn't just a lamb to slaughter... I don't know if this was a lie, or part of a bigger picture... Maybe i'm thinking to much into it but If it wasn't part of a bigger plan why would you hide it from me?... I don't want to live my life not knowing and I don't want to be in danger... I would rather die trying to protect you people down there... If that happens, then that is my thank you" she stopped to wipe away her tears.

"There's no going back now, there's no room for regret, I have to go" she stood up and turned away from the home that she had learned to love.

* * *

Run Kimi, Run far away and Don't look back~! Q.Q

Hope you're enjoying. Not gonna bother asking for reviews cause I don't even think people read this so... xD


	8. The Silent Witness

Remember while your reading that these events are paralell to things that really did happen in the Anime. While Kimi is doing something, the main story that we know is happening else where, try and connect them if you haven't already :)

* * *

Chapter 8 – The Silent Witness

Yuu fidgeted uncomfortably in her seat. She had no appetite and couldn't focus. Her mind kept wondering off, worrying about what was happening outside of the village and worrying about the girl who was shockingly still sleeping in her bedroom just around the corner.

She sighed and put down the chicken wing she was about to pretend to nibble at.

"I'm going to go and check on Kimi, It's not like her to miss dinner. Excuse me" her father nodded and she left.

Kimi's light was off which meant that she was indeed still sleeping. Yuu rapped the wooden frame of the door lightly with her knuckles. "Kimi? Are you ok in there?"

No answer.

"Can I come in?"

No answer. Yuu frowned slightly. It wasn't like her to plainly ignore people either.

She slid the door open slightly and poked her head in. To her surprise the room was empty.

"What the- Kimi?" No reply. "She must be in the bathroom"

She knocked the bathroom door and called again but had no reply. The door wasn't locked either, she could walk straight in to an empty bathroom. By the time she had checked the closet she was panicking.

"Kimi? Come out now, This isn't funny, Stop playing games!" Yuu ran outside and scanned Kimi's garden. She wasn't sitting up in the cherry blossom tree as she often did when she wanted to be left alone, nor was she sleeping on the roof watching the stars, as she did when the sky was clear at night. "KIMI!?" Yuu yelled out.

She ran back to the dining room and slammed the door open. "Kimi's gone! She not in her room or her garden, I can't find her!" She panted sounding terrified.

Shinsetsu slammed his cutlery down and stood up. "You're sure she's gone? Have you checked the rest of the manor?"

"No only her own private area of the manor, she doesn't often visit the rest of the house.."

"Check anyway, Yoshino and Chie help too, We must find her" They all left the room and split up to search, Yoshino heading off towards her office at the back right of the manor in a rush, Chie bustled away to the kitchen muttering under her breath and Shin joined Yuu at the front left where Kimi's room was.

He too found nothing.

"Where on earth has she disappeared to? She wouldn't have-"

"Left the village?" Yuu offered. "I think she would Dad" she paused. "What if she gets hurt.. or attacked.. dad we've got to find her!" now Yuu was more stressed out than ever, tears welling up in her eyes and her voice cracking.

"Why would she leave, she was told specifically told to stay put-" his eyes widened for a moment as he realised something. "Yuu, Did Kimi wake you up this morning? Did she tell you about having to stay home?"

Yuu titled her head in confusion. "No, Mom woke me up... She told me and said that you were the one who told her..."

Shin cursed loudly. "I knew it! I knew I shouldn't have trusted her to go off on her own! I'm better she followed me!"

"Dad! Calm down! What happened?" Yuu demanded as her usually calm and delightful father stormed off back into the house furiously. "DAD!?"

"Kimi must have over heard me discussing the situation with one of the soul reapers this morning. I'm better she heard everything that we've been trying to keep from her. Damn it!" she explaining as they pulled thick winter coats on and ran back out into the front courtyard. "We need to find the soul reapers and explain before they find her-"

Suddenly a gaggle of soul reapers came running into the courtyard.

"Ah! Sir! We have news!" said the male soul reaper from this morning.

"What is it? Has something happened? We have a problem, I was just coming to find you" Shin demanded.

"Yes, Someone was spotted trying to leave the village" one man began.

"We found them and pursued them but they got away, they were far to fast for us to keep up with.."another woman piped up from the middle of the group.

"There no chance that a normal villager could run that fast, it has to have been a soul reaper-" a younger woman added to her friend, sounding totally confused.

"Or someone who is training to be a soul reaper" Yuu interrupted, shooting a dark and meaningful look at her father.

"Kimiko!" Shin shouted. "All of this time I was trying to protect her... And I just made things worse!"

"Kimiko?" The first man asked, urging Shin to calm down.

"Kimiko is my daughter, she missing from her room, we've been searching the manor for her but i'm certain that she has ran away..."

"Now that you mention it we spotted the person because they screamed, and the scream sounded very feminine, they also looked very small and agile from what we could tell when chasing them" a woman at the back of the group pointed out.

Yuu ran forward. "If she screamed then she must be hurt! Please, you have to find her! You have to save her from being hurt!" Yuu pleaded with them. "I know we weren't supposed to leave the village, but please just find her and bring her home! I'm sure she has a perfectly good reason for thi-"

"Silence Yuu!" Shinsetsu yelled, rubbing his aching temple. "There is no excuse for her leaving, we specifically laid out rules that no one under any circumstances is to leave the village for their own safety and she disobeyed that" he paused to think again, his voice calming now. " Please try to find her and bring her home safely, I will deal with an appropriate punishment when she is back"

The soul reapers nodded in agreement and they family began to give any details of Kimi's habits, physical appearance and abilities that they could think of.

Kimi continued running in the direction of Fugai in district 5. She had long since passed all of the points of interest in her district and she was defiantly over the border and well into district 4 by now. It usually took about 30 minutes to get to the waterfall at the steady pace on foot and she had made it past there in less than 10 minutes.

As she travelled she ran over her plan in her mind, though it was very vague and she would probably end up changing her it as she went on.

_**First I'll make my way to Fugai and explore the surrounding areas, If I don't find anything I'll camp out **__**until I do find something or hear any news. After that... I guess I'll find somewhere to live... **_she thought. Again she felt a twinge of pain as she remembered what she was leaving behind, the comfort of her own bed, tasty breakfast's and hot dinners, fun memories... She shook herself to be rid of those thoughts. _**Maybe if I fix this mess and come out alive I can go back there, Maybe I'll be a hero! **_She smiled to herself, knowing she sounded naive but it was a possibility. People would be grateful to her if she solved an issue as big as this. She easily could end up being the hero of her village and she would be welcomed back with open arms.

She checked the Fugai's main town and saw that it too was riddled with soul reapers that were standing guard, so it wouldn't be safe for her to enter the town or rest near by. If they found her she would be up shit creak without a paddled, that is to say, In deep trouble.

She decided to go a fair distance out of the town and find a hollow tree to rest in for the night and continue in the morning. The last things she needed were to get caught of lost in a dense forest, so she followed a large open dirt road lined by forest.

She had only been running for a few minutes while scanning through the undergrowth when she heard footsteps fast approaching. She stopped and knelled down to watch a young soul reaper girl, who couldn't be any older than Kimi by appearance, running along the road alone carrying her sword and a bag on her back.

_**What the hell is a kid doing out here alone- wait, I'd be a hypocrite to ask that question.**_ She thought, mentally face palming. _**Wait! She's a soul reaper, who isn't guarding a village, and she's running in the area that the incident took place... Maybe he is running to the scene of the crime!**_

Kimi stood up and began to tail her silently at a safe distance, not losing sight of the blonde haired girl.

Without warning the girl slowed down and came to a stop in the middle of the road, Kimi mimicked her and looked in the direction she was now face.

A few meters in from of her shone bright red eyes, glinting like orbs of light.

"What the fuck!" Kimi whispered to herself loudly, but the girl was now too intent on running away to have heard her.

Kimi gulped, wondering what the hell that thing was but she was certain that it was now chasing the girl. She switched to the forest on the other side of the road, No chance was she gonna go near that thing. It had vanished and could be anywhere now.

She continued the follow the girl who looked as though she was already in a rush to get somewhere, but was now in a panic as this mysterious _thing_ followed her.

The creature moved swiftly out of the forest, heading right towards the girl. The moon was currently behind dense clouds so she was in almost darkness and the creature was a mere silhouette, though it was enough for her to see it dive down on the girl with its monstrous hand outstretched. Kimi gasped but the the girl dodged it and continued running.

The creature continuously attacked the girl, diving down on her and smashing rocks and trees with its sheer strength on impact.

"Why hasn't she drawn her sword and attacked it already!" Kimi demanded out loud, fearing for the girl's life even though she didnt know her.

The road finally widened out into a huge and open clearing. The monster made one more dive at the girl, this time she only just avoided it. Its hand pounded into the ground where the girl had been milliseconds before, she jumped aside and skidded backwards to face it.

The thing had hit the earth so had the it had crumbled and risen upwards.

The girl stared directly into the creature's gleaming red eyes for a moment, as if trying to think of a plan, but the creature launched forward in an attack again.

Out of nowhere came another silhouette. It blocked the creature with a sword and landed in front of the girl to protect her. The moon reappeared from behind the clouds to show a tall man...

**Wait.. Is that a guy or a girl?** Kimi asked herself,focusing on their long, flowing mane of straight blonde hair. They had their back to Kimi so she could only see their hair, white coat and sword, so that was all she could judge by.

"Shinji!" the girl exclaimed, relaxing a little behind the new person.

"Why ain'tcha drawn your Zanpakuto yet, huh?" came a snappy male voice.

_**Oh, so he is a guy! And what does he mean by Zanpakuto? Does he mean the swords? **_Kimi asked herself curiously. She listened in more, resting low in the bushes so non of them with see her.

"As if I could" the girl muttered, looking away from Shinji, a saddened expression on her face.

He was about to ask what she meant by the moonlight through the monstrous creature into sharp relief. The man gasped as the thing was revealed to be a huge man.

He too was wearing a white robe over the top of his soul reaper uniform, which was slightly open at the chest, revealing the number 69 tattooed on his abs. His arms were probably wider in muscle than Kimi's whole body, but what really caught her attention was the odd white mask that was covering his face, the huge white glove-like fists on his hands and the white bar-like objects protruding from his arms and back.

"what the hell is wrong with him?" Even Kimi who didnt really know much could tell that there was something seriously wrong with this man. He too was a soul reaper judging by the uniform, so why would he attack Shinji and the young girl? Was he out of control or something?

More footsteps came fast approaching them within seconds.

This time a number of soul reapers had come to their aid.

"Shinji!" shouted a tall woman in a uniform the style of a mini skirt, with black braided hair and glasses.

"Are you ok Hiyori?" A man with an afro haircut and sun glasses called over, he too was wearing a white robe. Another man with curly blonde haired was following close behind them. They all stopped shortly behind Shinji and Hiyori and stared at the monstrous man in disbelief. They too seemed to recognise him instantly. "K-Kensei... What's going on? That can't be.."

"Is that really Kensei?" the other blonde man asked. "His spiritual pressure... And that mask... It's just like a hollow's!"

there was a pause. They all continued to look at Kensei, who stared right back at them. "I don;t know if that really is Kensei, maybe it's just a hollow who has took on his appearance" Shinji began, changing stances. "But either way, if we don't draw our Zanpakuto's were as good as dead"

Suddenly the air felt heavy, like it was weighing down on Kimi, she felt like she was being crushed.

Kensei crouched down and roared, letting off a blast of green energy and shooting off into the air.

The man with the afro mimicked him and shot off too, staring around for him. Kensei reappeared behind him and punched him square in the back, causing an explosion of dust in mid air, the sound of the connection sound like a small explosion in itself.

"Love!" the curly blonde man called but Love was concealed by the dense cloud of smoke in the sky. The smoke eventually cleared and love was crouching with his sword drawn, completely out of breath.

"Don't you get it! That's Kensei up there! We can't-"

"Shut up Hiyori. Even if that is the real Kensei, we have to stop him. We can't let him rampage like this" Shinji said calmly.

"That's right Hiyori, we must do what is necessary, even if that means harming Kensei" the curly man agreed, stepping forward.

The black haired girl also stepped forward, drawing her sword. "There are plenty of ways to stop people without killing them, we should just cut off his limbs" she suggested seriously.

She shot off into the sky, followed by the curly blonde man who had also drawn his sword.

The girl repeatedly swung her sword at Kensei but never landed a hit. She slashed down on him, whirled around and slashed again and jumped back.

Out of nowhere the blonde man came crashing down on Kensei, but Kensei easily blocked this sword with his arm. It didnt even cut into him in the slightest.

The girl took this opportunity to try his other open side, but he blocked that with a huge white fist too and threw the two off like flimsy rag-dolls.

Kimi stared on in awe as they both landed neatly in mid-air as though they were standing on an invisible sheet of glass. She looked up at the blonde man, his sword was glinting in the moonlight... and _**what is that above him? **_Kimi wandered, seeing another something approaching. It was another silhouette.

Something approached him at high speed with a leg outstretched straight. It hit him straight on the head and booted him down to the ground like a football.

"ROSE!" the girl called down as the man collided with the ground and caused another explosion of dust.

Kimi had wanted to call "look out!" but had stopped herself. She didnt want to give herself away. If these soul reapers were getting so badly beat up, Kimi would probably die instantly.

Again, the moonlight showed that this new figure was a girl, with bright green hair, a pink scarf around her neck, black long sleeved soul reaper robes at the top with a badge wrapped around her right arm,a white mask that was a different shape to Kensei's and the same white substance that was on Kensei covered her legs like trousers.

The mask was kind of like the face of a bug, with large circle eyes, antenna and a oval face.

She stared down at the group for a moment and then launched down at them. She raised her leg and did a forward roll in mid air, picking up speed and kicking down on Shinji as she had done with Rose.

Her leg glowed bright red and exploded with a forceful energy.

Shinji had blocked her kick with his sword but she was overpowering him and forcing him downwards into the ground. She stopped, jumped back and charged forwards at Shinji again.

She front flipped in mid air again and began another kick on Shinji, but he blocked it with his sword, then rotate in the air and she began kicking repeatedly.

Shinji let his guard down for a split second and she almost landed a high kick in his face when another male voice called out to them.

"Quintet of Iron pillars!" Five iron pillars descended from the sky, as if spat out by the heavens, and landed around the green haired girl like a cage. The girl let out a unearth screech and Kimi looked for the new comer.

She couldn't quite see from here so she darted around the tree next to her to look from the other side.

A short and largely round man with a tuft of bright pink hair, a pink moustache and magenta clothing stood a few meters away from her with his hands pressed tightly together.

"You are all so fast, I couldn't keep up, but I'm glad I made it in time" he panted as thought he had ran a marathon to get here.

"Hachi!" Shinji said thankfully.

Hachi paused and looked up Kensei who was still fighting with Love in the air above them. He reached out an open hand and recited: "Way of binding number Sixty-three: Winding binding chains!" and closed his hand into a fist.

An intensly bright light in the form of golden chain descended from the sky, winding their way down towards Kensei and wrapping him up tightly. Kensei gave out a screech like Mashiro's and literally fell out of the sky.

"Shinji, What on earth is going on here? Why does Kensei resemble a Ho-" but Hachi cut off, realising that Kensei was breaking free from the glowing chains. He reared up onto his legs, writhing around and eventually forced his way out of the chains, snapping them into hundreds of glowing pieces that vanished into thin air.

Everyone gathered around Hachi. "He broke out the the Winding Binding chains so easily, so I'll need to use my strongest techniques against him, I need you all to help me get a clear shot at him, but you may get caught in the spell too..." Hachi explained cautiously.

"Is that all?" Love asked. "I'll get his attention so get him while he's focused on me"

"I'll help" the black haired girl announced, Rose agreed.

"No, I'll go alone. You guys are already covered in injuries, just watch my back" he didnt wait for them to answer or argue but charged forward. Rose began to shoot small blasts of blue light from his hand at Kensei.

Kimi winced as the blast caused small explosions of dust and dirt but Kensei came out of them completely unphased.

Love took the chance to strike as the dust cleared but again, to Kimi's horror, Kensei seemed to have not even feel the blade sinking deep into his shoulder. He punched love like he was swaying a fly and Lisa dove down on his from behind but was thrown off.

"Hachi, NOW!" she shouted.

Hachi made a hand sign with both hands and chanted: "Way of binding number 98: Restrain!" Out of thin air appeared two long, thick ribbons of materials, though what they were made of Kimi had no idea, but they were incredibly strong. They wrapped him Kensei and then, again from thin air, heavy blocks of stone appeared to weigh down the material and drag Kensei to the ground.

The group gathered their downed comrade but they were now too far away to talk.

Now that Kensei was restrained Kimi felt slightly safer, she wasn't now scared that she would some how get dragged into this, but thought too soon. She had been phasing out, staring at the seem and remembering everything she had seen when suddenly their came an ear splitting, unearthly roar.

Kimi snapped out of her daydream and saw that Hiyori, the girl she had followed, was now standing in the middle of them, screaming and wearing a white mask... just like the ones Kensei and the green haired girl were wearing. The air itself suddenly became dense, heavy and painful.

Kimi was dragged down to the floor in pain as she heard people shouting Hiyori's name.

Her vision went completely black, she thought she was dying, she had gone blind and the weight of the ear was causing her to struggle with breathing. She began to panic and then heard more screams and slashes of swords on skin.

Her vision came back to her and the air became lighter. Kimi was now panting quickly and still felt weak but she forced herself to her hands and knees and peered through the bushes.

To her surprise there was now a new person in the clearing with them. A coloured man wearing a white cloak and a face mask.

"Kaname... You... You betrayed Kensei?" Shinji gasped while clutching a stab wound.

"He didn't betray anyone, In fact he's extremely loyal" Came another voice from someone to Kimi's left. A tall browned man wearing the uniform and glasses was now entering the clearing from the same route Kimi and Hiyori had taken, accompanied by a young boy with silvery white hair, he too was wearing a uniform but looked far too young to be a Soul Reaper. Both of them had their swords drawn. "He obeyed every single order I gave him"

Shinji turned to them, now looking angry. "Aizen! You... I knew it!"

"Oh so you noticed? And for how long?"

"Since you were in your mothers womb, I always knew you were dangerous! I knew you were the sort of person who should never be trusted, that why I made you my Lieutenant, to keep an eye on you at all times"

Aizen chuckled. "And I'm grateful for that, Captain. Thanks to your suspicious nature you never realized-"

"Of course I realized! I just said so!" Shinji snapped.

"No, you didnt realize. For the past months it wasn't I who followed you."

"What the- You always follow me-"

"Your biggest mistake, Captain Hirako, was keeping me at arms length. If you'd have treated me the same way so everyone else did, you'd have realized that it wasn't me follow you around all for all of this time. You see, captain, the true ability of my Zanpakuto" he paused to unsheathe his sword. "What I like to call "Absolute Hypnosis". That is to say, I can make my enemies think, do or see whatever I want them to."

Again Shinji looked horrified. Kimi too gasped and tried not to look at the gleaming sword that was now shimmering in the moonlight, in fear of being hypnotised too.

_**But maybe it will only hypnosis on command... or if it stabs you**_ she hoped.

"You never got close tome, trusted me, opened up to me or tried to know me like others did. Perhaps if you did you would have recognised the imposter and his mannerisms." he sheathed his sword again. "I had my fake memorize my behavioural patterns and the way which I interact with individuals. Even so if you had paid attention you would have spotted subtle mistakes. Do you understand now, Captain?"

Shinji did not answer, just started at the man.

"And one more thing. You say that you chose me to be your Lieutenant so to keep an eye on me, but that is incorrect."

"Excuse me?"

"Captains have the right to chose their Lieutenant's, but lieutenant's equally have to right to refuse the offer. That very rarely happens but nonetheless, I had the choice to not become your lieutenant. Why did I not refuse? Because your suspicious nature provided the perfect environment and conditions for my plans. You did not chose me Captain, I chose you."

Shinji was now looking furious, but Aizen and the two others were completely calm. "You should really take a moment to apologize to your friends. They're on the ground unconscious and bleeding all because of you"

"AIZEN!" Shinji sprang up with sword ready but almost instantly froze as the clay like substance exploded from his mouth and eyes.

"Damn it! Not me too!" he choked.

"Thank you for letting me provoke you, Captain" Aizen smirked. The clay began to take the shape of a new mask on the right side of his face.

Shinji whirled around to see the others behind him, who were still unconscious on the floor were also spewing white clay and developing their own masks.

"AIZEN?! What's going one?!" Aizen looked delighted.

"It seems that the hollowfication process is accelerated when the subject is agitated" the coloured man said to Aizen as he passed him.

"H-hollowfication? W-what is that?" Shinji stuttered and then began to scream in pain.

"You don't need to know. Kaname"

"Yes sir" the man replied. Without any further questions Kaname unsheathed his sword and slashed Hiyori, who had slowly been approaching them from behind. Even though the mask was fully formed and her eyes had changed colour she still seemed to have a reasonable amount of control over herself.

Shinji attacked him from behind but he countered and jumped aside.

"I don't know what the hell is going on, but don't assume that everything will go according to plan just yet"

There was a moments silence, then kaname called for instructions.

"Proceed. The lose of one sample will not make much of a difference." Aizen said codly.

"A sample? Is that all I am to you?" Shinji called.

_**A sample? So he is using them as lab rats for some sort of experiments? Wait... Could he be behind all of these deaths?! **_Kimi thought. The severity of the situation she was in was beginning to dawn on her. She knew she wasn't safe here even if she was hidden, she had to move but she couldn't take her eyes off of the scene, she wanted to find out more.

Kaname charged forward to attack Shinji but he blocked. They both landed a few good hits for a and then slid away from each other to face off. Again, Shinji was silent and looking as though he was in pain. Kaname began a second assault but was soon sent flying into the ground.

_**Hes a lot stronger than he looks, or is that due to the mask? **_Kimi thought again.**_ Those masks... They seem to send people wild... so how is he able to control it?_**

Kaname freed himself from debris that was now on top of him where he had landed. "My apologies... I will dispose of him now" he panted.

"Don't worry Kaname, I had expected this." Aizen turned to the other Soul Reapers who were still unconscious on the floor a few meters from them. White clay was now wildly splashing around their faces like gargling water that was trying to escape. "The speed of the hollowfication process varies from person to person." Again, Shinji began to puke out white clay which forcefully spread across along this left side and down his back. "Thank you, Captain Hirako, you have prove to be a magnificent experiment and fascinating to watch... But I'm finished with you now. Let's put this to an end, shall we?"

Kimi gasped._** NO! He's not going to kill him too?!**_

Aizen slowly began to unsheathe his sword and raised it high into the air, Kimi tried not to look at it but it shone like a gem in the moonlight. "One last thing for you to learn, Captain. There is no fear when one expects to be betrayed, the true fear is when the betrayal is unexpected. Farewell."

_**Betrayal?! So he is responsible! He IS the enemy here!**_ She now wanted more than every to stand tall and help, but she knew she was powerless in this situation.

"GOD DAMNIT!" Shinji raged at the top of his lungs, clay writhing violently.

Kimi forced her eyes shut and dropped to the ground, not wanting to see the blonde haired man get killed. Again she wanted to run for help but her legs were too shaky to move. But there was no slash or scream or pain, but instead the sound of someone landing on the ground. She looked up and peered through the bushes again. There stood a black cloaked and hooded figure holding a sword and facing directly at Aizen, followed by a much taller and larger man in a blue and golden cloak.

Like the others, she couldn't quiet make out the cloaked man's features or expressions at her current distance and in such light except small tufts of mousey blonde hair poking out from under his hood, but she hoped he was an ally and not another enemy.

"Oh? We have unexpected guests." Aizen stated, not sounding in the slightest bit worried, more interested in the new arrivals.

"Ops, looks like they found us" the silver haired boy finely spoke, also jokingly.

Kaname's hand flew to he handle of his sword. "I'll kill them!"

"No, Kaname."

"But Sir-"

"Kaname. I think I made myself clear. I said no." The seriousness of Aizen's tone was more frightening then his usual taunting tone. Even the hairs on the back of Kimi neck stood on end.

Kaname faltered and was quick to drop to the ground in a low bow. "Yes Sir, my apologies, please forgive my insolence"

Aizen did not answer but turned away from him, almost in disgust.

"Ki-kisu-ke..." Shinji was now crawling toward the black cloaked man. His voice had a sort of strange, rattly, echoed pitch to it that was not there before. "You fool, why did you come here?"

"SHINJI?! What's up with your face?!" The moment Kimi heard that voice, she felt an unbearable stabbing pain in her head and blanked out again. This time instead of images rolling across her vision she heard voices. As clear as though they shouting down her ears but at the same time, distant.

"_I'm alive!"_

"_Not exactly-" _the cloaked man's voice chuckled. _"Now little girl-" the voice seemed to skip conversations. "Yeah yeah, ok, now kid, sorry to spring this on you, but its dangerous here and you need to move on- _Look i'm going to help you move on to the next life by giving you a Soul Burial, you can rest in peace- "I don't have time for this, It's too dangerous here right now, if it was any other time I would help, but I can't. Goodluck kid, you'll be needing it."

Kimi awoke from her memory, the ear seeming to rush into her ears as though the voices had just got up and left. She gasped for ear and clutched her head tightly.

"What the hell... He.. He was the one who saved me..." she mumbled, staring over at the man. "It's him! I found him!" she was suddenly excited and wanted to speak to the man, to be on his side and to help him but that fact that she couldnt possibly help was killing her.

She focused as the man began to speak again. "So, Lieutenant Aizen. What have you done?"

"Nothing." he answered quickly, guilt written all over his straight face. "You see, I stumbled upon the investigation team here like this. It seems they were injured in battle, I tried to save their lives"

Kimi's rage flared.

_**You liar! You did! You murderer! You wont get away with this!**_ though she wasnt one hundred percent sure that the others were dead, they hadnt moved for an awefully long time.

"You bastard, they'll never buy that bullshit" shinji hissed.

There was a pause in which Urahara lowered his head, seemly disappointed. "Why are you lieing to us?" he asked quietly, as though encouraging a misbehaving child to confess.

"Lying? Is there a problem with a Lieutenant trying to help his captain and fellow Soul Reapers?"

"No. But that's not what I meant. You called these injuries? Injured in battle?" he scanned the bodies on the ground. "Quit dodging bullets. This is hollowfication." Aizen did not comment, just stared directly at Urahara. "First is the vanishing souls. Soul Reapers and Rukon residents vanishing as though they had been erased, and now what we see here. It can only be one thing. Hollow fication research."

Aizen glared at him. Urahara bowed his head again. "Someone has been doing research around this place- No actually, We know exactly who is responsible-"

A smirk broke out on Aizen's face. "Your reputation proceeds you, Captain Urahara. Asa matter of fact I'm glad that you joined us tonight." he said, sheathing his sword and turning to his two comrades. "Gin, Kaname. We have fullfilled our objective, let's leave." they too turned to follow behind him in the direction of the path that they entered from, right next to Kimi's hiding spot.

Her heart raced and she dropped low to the ground again, too frightened to watch them incase they felt her eyes on them.

"Stop Sousuke! We're not finished!" Urahara roared.

"Captain, move out of the way!" the tall coloured man with the blue and golden cloak shouted too. He raised his arm into a sort of hand sign gesture. "Way of destruction eighty eight: Flying Dragon Strike, Heaven Shaking Lightning Cannon!" Electric blue chains of lightning ripped through the air right at Aizen, leaving a sonic boom that sounded like roars behind them.

Kimi braced herself for impact, crouncing intoa ball on the floor with her arms wrapped around her head. Her white lighted spirit energy once again acted like a shield around her and lit up brightly, but what happened next happened so fast that she wouldn't have seen it if she had actually watched.

A gigantic wall erupted out of the ground and blocked the lightning chains completely, causing the place to go pitch even from the moonlight for a split moment, and then the impact of lightning on wall caused a hueg flaming explosion.

There was a sound of shattering glass, and at the same time Kimi's shield vapourised like white mist. When she looked up Aizen was gone. She stood upand looked around the clearing to see the two men also looking around. She back away slowly, but as she went to turn and run away he bumped into something tall.

She almost screamed. It was him, Aizen, standing right next to her, smiling down at her. His two comrades emerged from the shadows behind him.

"It seems we had another unexpected guest lurking in the shadows" Gin the young boy smiled.

"Yes, it seems so" Aizen agreed.

Kimi back off into a tree behind her. "How did you know I was here?"

"I could sense your leaking Spirit Energy, and then I saw a white glow in the trees as we left. You should learn to control that." Kimi felt like kicking herself. How foolish of her to give away her possition, but it was true that she really couldn't control it all that well. "How long were you watching for?"

Kimi bit her tongue. _**If tell the truth he'll probably kill me, If I lie he'll know im lieing and kill me... and if i dont answer... **_"Since before you arrived. I saw everything." she said slowly, readying herself to run.

"Sir, she is a witness, shall i kill her?" Kaname asked reaching for his sword again. Kimi pulled back again placing her feet ready to bolt in an instant.

"No Kaname, enough. I have other ideas." he looked her up and down for a moment. "You are not a Soul reaper are you?"

"No, I'm not."

"I thought not. You have no sword and you are wearing black but not as our uniform. Your spirit energy is too weak to be a fully fledged soul reaper but far stronger than the average rukon resident. Tell me, do you plan to become a Soul Reaper?"

Kimi was wearing of his every move and word. He was unpredictable. "Yes, I do."

He smiled. "Good. With energy like that I believe you have potential, you just need training."

"I have already been training myself for a few months"

"But that is not real training. Though your stealth and concealment would be exceptional if your energy wasn't leaking. Look, Girl. Do you know what these do?" he asked, turning to the side and showing her his sheathed sword.

Kimi's heart skipped a beat. He was going to hypnotise her. "Yes I do, you dont need to show me, I know what those swords do"

"Oh but mine is unique, not all swords have the same abilities, you see-" he unsheathed it and Kimi clamped her eyes shut. She didn't know if the hypnosis would trigger from looking at the blade or with a spell, but she didn't want to risk it. "Oh? so you heard that part too, did you? That's good. You are observant."

She began to edge slowly to her left, not losing eye contact with them, into a better posistion to run from.

"I wouldn't move if I were you"

"But your not me so..." she didnt finish her sentance. She crouched and pushed away fromthe ground in a millisecond flash step.

"You little-" Kaname began but Aizen held out a had to stop him from pursuing her.

"Let her run. It's too late for her."

Kimi was now gliding through the forest floor as fast as her legs would carry her, so that the trees were new blurs as she passed them. She didnt care which direction she was going as long as she escaped from them. She know knew who was responsible and she could most likely hand the three over to the Soul Reapers, she just needed to get to safety.

She turned her head while running to see if they were following. Nothing. They were out fo sight.

_Squelch._ Kimi was forcefully stopped. There was an horfic pain in her chest. She coughed and bought up blood and turned to look for the source. A long shining blade was embeded in her chest, right below her heart. She struggled for breath and her vision went blurry. She couldn;t make out her attacker, but she was pretty sure she could see glasses glinting in the light from the tree tops.

Kimi's body hung limply on the sword that hand impaled her and Aizen threw her to the floor.

He stood over her lifeless body for a moment. "Kaname, see to it that she doesn't remember any of this."

"Sir."

* * *

AN: I know I basically wrote out what happened in the Anime, that's because the event needs to happen exactly the same, not different in any way. The only time an event will change is if Kimiko got involved somehow. She was only watching this, if she'd have actually spoke to them, revealed herself, touched one of them, got hurt or anything like that, history would be very different. Just witnessing this will eventually change EVERYTHING.

Have you ever thought what would have happened if you didn't do something?  
For example "where would I be now if I hadn't have talked to my now boyfriend for the first time in maths class?" I'm a big believer in the fact that one simple action can change the course of your life.

I tried to make it interesting so I hope that worked.. Enjoy I guess :)


	9. Lost, Found and Framed

Chapter 9 Lost and Found

Kimiko opened her eyes slowly. This had been the second time she had been woken by a cold breeze and found herself in unfamiliar surroundings. She lay there on the frozen solid ground staring up at thick grey clouds, watching tiny white flakes float down onto her.

She looked around without moving her head. It hadn't been snowing long, thankfully. Everything she could see was covered with a thin dusting of snow like frosting on a cake, including her clothes judging by the feeling of wet wool against her skin.

"Where am I?" she asked herself croakily. "Why am I in a forest?"

She continued to lie there staring up at the sky quite contently. This was her first snow since arriving here. It was, in a strange way, peaceful and beautiful to watch and quite fascinating. The temperature was surprisingly mild, If the snow hadn't have been seeping into her woollen clothes and making her damp she could happily have lay there all day without feeling even a chill. She tried to think. Why was she there? Had she been on a job for someone? Was she travelling?

Suddenly voices, heavy footfalls and the cracking of twigs came from somewhere to her right.

"Over there! There's someone here!" a woman called. A number of people were approaching but Kimi continued to look up at the sky.

"You! Girl!" a new male voice called. "What is your name, where are you from and what are you doing here?" Kimi blinked and snapped out of her phase. She heaved herself up with great difficultly, realising that she had muscle ache all over as though she had done a lot of exercise and a stiff neck and back from sleeping in the cold. All of the Soul Reapers had their swords pulled slightly out of their scabbards.

She eyed the shining metal for a moment hesitantly. "Kimiko Murasaki... Harumachi in district two-" she croaked, her breathe vaporising in front of her. She was about to say that she didn't actually know why she was here when the surrounding group of black uniformed Soul Reapers gave a collective sigh of relief and clicked their swords back.

"That's a relief. Go and inform the family" one of them instructed another, they left quickly. "We've been looking for you all night"

"Looking for me all night? How did I get here? Why was I sleeping on the ground?" This man towered over her like a big built giant, either that or he was tall and fat. He wore a purple shirt underneath his black uniform, a golden chain around his neck and a Lieutenant's badge on his left arm. His hair was a light chestnut brown and was styled into a fluffy Elvis-doo. He gave off the air of an extremely wealthy man and looked a little pompous at first sight.

The man shrugged. "All we know is that you ran away from your village sometime last night and we've been searching for you ever since. Just come with us. We need to ask you a few questions and we'll get you back to your family safely later" he looked at her clothing. It was ripped and frayed in places, as though it had gotten caught on things while she was moving. Her skin was grazed and dirty. "But we'll examine you and get you cleaned up first." He added as an after thought, as though the state of her filthy clothes disgusted him.

Kimi nodded in agreement, but when she tried to stand she fell back down. Her legs were numb and her body was aching all over.

The man helped her up and offered to carry her. He hoisted her up onto his back and the group departed.

"It's quite a way away, it'll take some time to get there so just rest" One of the women that were accompanying them smiled. She didn't event need to tell her, she was out like a light bulb within minutes despite the pain and biting wind on her skin.

As Kimi slept, the Soul Reapers discussed the fact that Kimi was soaked in the spiritual pressure that had been found at the site of the crime.

"So she was definitely there, no mistaking it."

* * *

Quite some time later, though she wasn't sure how long, Kimi was being woken by the Lieutenant that had carried her, having been dropped down onto a bed like a sack of potato's.

Kimi felt the impact and woke up with a jolt, disorientated for a moment.

"Ah good, you're awake. We've bought you to the District one Rukon treatment centre on the edge of the Seireitei. Once you've been examined and cleaned up we'll take you in for questioning." he explained, his tone cold and business like. He had been holding some fabric in his hand, which had turned out to be a thick woollen blanket that he threw down at her. It looked like a piece of cloth against him, he was so large.

"I've requested that the Captain of squad four and the medical corp. comes to examine you, as your evidence may very well be key to this investigation. We need you fit and well. Wait here for her. They'll contact us with the results of your treatment." and with that he walked out of the door and left Kimi alone in the clean white treatment room.

Kimi blinked in surprise, not expecting him to be so blunt.

Though it did make sense. If what they had said was true and from what Kimi could gather, she had been found unconscious near some sort of crime scene... They would obviously want her to be well enough to recall anything that she had seen.

She wrapped the blanket around herself and wondered over to a chair at the corner of the room facing out of the window.

Her body still felt cold, stiff and numb from lying in the snow and being held in one position on a huge man's back for so long.

She sat staring out of the window for a while, attempting to remember anything as the snow got heavier and heavier. Even from inside this warm and comfy room the snow was still fascinating... entrancing.

_**The reason I was outside must be because I'd planned to leave the village that night... I remember what Shin said..** _she thought, remembering how painful it had been to hear the truth._** I just don't remember actually leaving my bedroom. I don't know what I did to end up outside and unconscious. **_It suddenly occurred to her that if she had left she probably wouldn't be able to return or face the family, where would she go after this? Would she be punished?

The door to the room opened slowly and Kimi's head flicked round.

Kimi's eyes widened as a tall and beautiful woman with shining black hair that was tied into thick braids underneath her chin, wearing a white captains cloak entered the room, followed by a tall young man with black hair.

The woman smiled serenely at her and introduced herself. "Hello, I am Retsu Unohana, Captain of the fourth squad and this is my Lieutenant, Seinosuke Yamada. We're here to get you examined" the man nodded and smiled as he was introduced.

"He-hello, I'm Kimiko Murasaki..." she said somewhat awkwardly.

Unohana smiled again. "Lets begin then. Seinosuke, if you don't mind"

"Of course ma'am. I'll be patrolling around the department if you need me" much to Kimi's relief he bowed and left the room closing the door behind him. She didn't really want to be examined by a man, she would have felt awkward and uncomfortable.

"Lets see then." Unohana proceeded to take Kimi's weight and measurements, give her a few general check ups on her hearing, eyesight, balance and etc. jotting notes down on a clip board as she went.

"Well good news. You're fit and healthy. You are a little underweight and short for your age but that's due to your metabolism and hormones. You've got a few scrapes and bruises which I can heal for you now. Other than that I think a nice warm mug of soup will do you the world of good" she smiled again.

Kimi sighed. "That's good, thank you." Unohana began to heal Kimi's small wounds with a pale green light emitting from her hands. She guessed that this was Unohana's Spirit energy, she could feel it around her, like a powerful presence.

"Excuse me.." Kimi asked hesitantly while Unohana was fixing a bloody scrape on her knee.

"I'm a little bit concerned about my brain..." she knew it sounded stupid and Unohana too looked a little taken aback.

"In what way do you mean?"

"It's just, I've had amnesia since I got here and I lost all of my memories of my life in the world of the living and now I've lost my memories of what happened to me last night.. Its like those times never even happened... I'm worried that there is something wrong with me... Is this sort of thing normal?" now that she was finally near a professional she was ready and hoping for answers, she couldn't let an opportunity like this pass. If there was anything that could be done to fix the problem this woman would know it.

Unohana could hear the genuine concern in Kimi's voice and pondered for a moment.

"It isn't unheard of for someone who has died and become a Soul to suffer with minor Amnesia, but for it to reoccur like this... Usually the memories would come back to them within a few months, a year at the most.."

"I've been here nearly eight months now and I don't remember much... I have small flashbacks occasionally... but nothing that makes sense to me"

"If that is the case" she wondered over to the door and popped her head out. "Seinosuke, some assistance please?" and the young man from before re-entered the door. "I'd like for you to help me run some tests on Miss. Murasaki's brain, she is suffering from an unusual form of Amnesia, or that's what it seems like. I would like a second opinion on the matter in case I miss something."

The two of them proceeded to do tests on Kimi, though she wasn't hooked up to machines with pipes and wires. They simply held their hands on her head and began using that green light again.

Kimi felt a little awkward and just looked around the room not knowing what was going on.

Neither of them spoke, they seemed to be in deep concentration.

Kimi sat there waiting for something to happen or for either of them to say something for around twenty minutes. She had been sitting up with no support on her back or neck like pillows and felt extremely uncomfortable... but she was afraid to move in case she interrupted whatever it was they were doing.

She began to fidget uncomfortably, trying to move herself into a better position without disturbing them when all of a sudden the man spoke.

"Captain-!"

"Yes I know, I noticed it too"

Kimi's heart did a somersault. "What? What's is it? Is something wrong?"

"It seems as though a powerful Memory Lock Kido has been placed on you." Unohana told her, lowering her hands. "Now that I have found the spell I can sense traces of the Spiritual Pressure on you, which means that the Kido spell was only performed very recently. I'm surprised I didn't sense it sooner"

"So that means someone have locked away my memory?"

"Yes. And only within the last day or so, which means this could be used as evidence. Excuse me, I must begin writing a report on this immediately."

"Wait! Is there no way to unlock it? Can I not get it back?"

"Perhaps if it was a weaker, lower level Kido, or if it had been performed by an amateur, but this is seems to be Captain level. They've done a good job of it. I would be almost impossible to unlock without permanently damaging your brain and memories. The only thing that can be done is to wait for the Kido to weaken over time, though I'm not sure how long that would take... I'm sorry"

Kimi shock her head and smiled. "It's Ok, I didn't expect there to be a way to retrieve my lost memories instantly. If I have to wait that's fine as long as there is a way"

Unohana nodded. "Seinosuke can you inform the patrol squad that we are finished and will get the results to them as soon as possible and to come and collect Miss Murasaki?"

"Yes Ma'am" he nodded.

"Thank you. You should be fine from here on Miss Murasaki. Good luck"

"Thank you very much!" Kimi bowed. She was truly grateful. She was a kind woman who had helped put Kimi's mind to rest slightly. And with that Unohana smiled and left. Her Lieutenant held his hand out and a small black butterfly appeared out of nowhere, landed on it and then flew away again after a few seconds.

Kimi looked at him questioningly.

"I've sent a message to the patrol squad to come and get you, they will take you to be questioned at their department just down the road, you should get some rest until they arrive" and he too left the room.

Kimi was still slightly confused with everyone flitting in and out of her room in seconds and telling her all of this information. She lay down on the bed and waited, butterflies floating around in her stomach as she thought about being interrogated.

Horrible thoughts went through her mind, as they do when your dreading something. She didn't know what she had done after leaving her room. What if she had done something bad? Was she a suspect? What if she was wrongly accused or sentenced? She did leave the village when it was under curfew after all.. maybe that was a crime... And she didn't even know what she had done after leaving her bedroom that night, it was all blank. She could have done anything from there on.

She sandwich slapped herself with both hands roughly. "Snap out of it! You've done nothing wrong! I hope..."

* * *

Soon after, the tall and fat Lieutenant from the patrol squad was back again. He escorted her out of the building and straight into a fancy looking horse drawn carriage. The temperature had dropped considerable while she had been inside and the snow was now a few inches deep.

Kimi really was oddly fascinated by the snow, continuing to stare out of the window as they made their way across the town, until she spotted something that made her eyes widen in surprise and her heart fluttered again.

She started to notice more and more teenagers walking around wearing the same type of Uniform, very similar to a Soul Reaper's uniform. A white shirt that had a logo on the breast pocket with a long coloured strip along the length of their shoulders that matched the colour of their Hakama trousers, blue for boys and red for girls. The majority of the people she spotted were carrying wooden swords on their backs or books in their arms.

They turned a corner and Kimi saw a gigantic white building across the road to her left.

"Is that..."

"Hm? That? Oh, that's the Shino Academy for Soul Reapers" the Lieutenant said off-hand, not bothered in the slightest.

"No way..." she was so close, so damn close to her dream! She had wanted for so long to join the academy and become a real Soul Reaper, to get a sword, use her power to help people... and now that she was so close she wanted nothing more than to leave the carriage, forget about her questioning and go and sign her at the academy.

The Lieutenant laughed as Kimi continued to press her face against the window. She tried to crane her neck to get a good look through the entrance as they passed it, but it was gone quicker than it had came.

She had only been close to it for a brief few moments, but it had been in touching distance. Even though it was now gone her ambition to join was now bigger than ever. She was determined that she would one day be one of those students, walking along the road during winter while playing in the snow with her friends at their lunch break.

She sat back down and thought of what she would do when she got back home. Then again the fact that she had ran away from her home and may possible not have anywhere after his struck her like a led weight, though she tried to forget about it.

They finally came to a halt outside of a similar building to the academy, though a lot smaller.

"Were here. This is the District One Rukon Investigation Department. Seeing as only Soul Reapers are allowed to enter the Seireitei we deal with all Rukon related investigations, crimes and questionings here." Kimi simply nodded. Feeling more and more anxious.

As they entered another young man approached them hurriedly. "Lieutenant, thank goodness. We must hurry, the time was move up! Their inquest is due to begin any time soon, they need our evidence right away!"

"Whaaatt? Already? The hell... they could have warned us! C'mon kid we need to get this out of the way"

They entered a small and dark room with a number of uniformed officers in and began to ask her questions.

She explained one hundred percent truthfully about what she had heard in the village, what she knew about the problems in the Rukon with the deaths and disappearances, how she had felt about being lied to, how she wanted to help.

"And that's it. I remember planning to leave and after that.. everything is just blank."

The lieutenant sat back in his chair and thought to himself. "Why would you just forget like that?"

"The woman who healed me says that a memory lock was put on me" Kimi said noobishly. They looked at her funny. "I'm not lying! Its the truth! She said she would write a report and-" Kimi began to desperately defend herself when the door was knocked and opened. A woman bought in a file of papers to the Lieutenant and he sat in silence as he read.

It had been around twenty minutes since they started the questioning and the Reapers were looking more and more agitated and rushed.

"Is that so..." he uttered to himself. Kimi stared at him with narrowed eyes.

"You see? I was telling the truth."

He nodded, in an apologetic way, though it seemed actually apologizing would hurt his ego.

He held up the file. "Some send a message of our evidence to the judges, I expect they are in for questioning about now." a man a red uniform flitted in out of nowhere, took the papers and scanned over them, then left without a word.

"Sorry but... Was someone caught?"

He hesitated. "Yes. They were caught late last night in the Seireitei and they trial has only recently began. This evidence will help a lot."

"Good, I'm glad."

* * *

Kisuke Urahara and Tessai Tsukabishi were frog down a long corridor and into a court room, their hands shackled with planks of wood and chains behind their backs.

A narrow walk way led through tall rows of seats and down into a circular room. The door was shut behind them with a slam and a bright interrogation light was turned on above them.

They could now see the towering rows of seats, where judges sat behind paper screens gazing down upon them.

There was silence for a moment and Urahara spoke up. "So, will someone tell us what's going on here?"

"No one granted you permission to speak. This is an inquest. You have been bought her for question and you will only speak to answer questions, is that understood squad twelve captain?"

Urahara didn't not answer. _**Inquest? Am I being accused of something?**_

A voice came from his high right and he turned to the speaker, which sounded like an elderly man. "Can you tell us your whereabouts last night?"

He didn't hesitate, he had nothing to hide. "District six in west Fugai"

"Conducting hollowfication experiments?" he hinted, as if assuming that he knew what Urahara could be hiding.

His eyes widened. "Wait! Hold on a minute! Who told you that?" He demanded in horror.

"As part of your research you tested hollowfication on the captain of squads three, five, seven and nine and their lieutenants." There was a pause where Urahara stared at the speaker in realisation.

_**It was him, it was Aizen. He told them that, he framed me!**_

"Who told you that?"

"You don't deny it?"

"It was lieutenant Aizen wasn't it?" He snarled, his head bowed in anger. "We only went out there to rescue Shinji and the others, not to harm them!"

The main speaker laughed. "Your lies are beginning to sound more and more comical. Besides the lieutenant of squad five never left his barracks last night. We have the sworn statements of one captain and one hundred and twenty four members. That makes it very hard to doubt."

"But he was... He was there last night... In Fugai! Not in the Seireitei!" Urahara shouted completely confused.

A man wearing a red and black uniform and a wooden hat dropped into out of thin air behind them. He knelt into a bow. Urahara turned to look at him. Tessai continued to look sternly forward. "Have new information. We searched the squad twelve barracks and found undeniable evidence of hollowfication experiments. Also a suspected witness was found near Fugai this morning. The child had had a captain level Memory Lock Kido placed on her which was unbreakable. She was also bathed in powerful Spiritual Pressure similar to that which was found at the scene of the crime."

The main speaker laughed again. "Tessai Tsukabishi, Captain of the Kido corps is already being charged with using a number of forbidden Kido spells. I guess you thought you would clean up after yourselves and make sure the child couldn't remember what she had seen. Too bad she was found and question."

Tessai finally looked up and was about to speak.

"There was another? A child? I knew I sensed a small Spiritual Pressure but I didn't have time to go and look for the owner of it! We never went near the child! It was Aizen! Sosuke Aizen has framed us!"

"Silence!" The man bellowed down at him. "We have heard enough. It is time to pass judgement. Commander Tessai Tsukabishi, for the crime of using numerous forbidden techniques you will be imprisoned in underground prison three. Captain Urahara of squad twelve, for conducting research on banned phenomenon and in doing so to causing harm to fellow squad members you will be sentence to an eternal ban to the World of the Living and will be stripped of all Spirit Energy." Urahara stared at the ground. Having nothing more to say. He could argue this case a much as he wanted but it wouldn't make a difference.. this was the end.. he might as well give up.

"Further more, the Captains and Lieutenants who were the victims of your evil and cruel experiments will be disposed of as hollows."

Urahara head shot up in shock. "You can't! Wait a minute!"

Sudden the door to the court slammed open. A masked and capped silhouette stood in the door way, backed with an intense white light for the outside. Urahara had forgotten how dark it was in here, even under all of these interrogation spotlights.

The person launched down into the court and broke the shackles that were holding Urahara and Tessai, and knocked out the guard that had attempted to stop them.

The three of them escaped together down the long lit corridor, dodge the unconscious bodies on the floor and hear shouts of "Guards! Guard! Is there anyone there?" And "Seize them!" from the courtroom behind them.

They ran in silence for a long time, out of central 46 and away from the Seireitei until they were eventually high up in the mountains.

The one that had saved them finally stopped in front of them and removed their mask and cape.

"Yoruichi.. Is knew it.. Thank you" Urahara sighed in relief, stretching his arms. Those shackles were tight and uncomfortable. He looked to his left and noticed that Shinji and the others were lying in an unconscious pile near them.

"I went ahead and bought all of them over here along with your new Gigai prototype..." She paused awkwardly. "You should have asked for my help last night you idiot." She snapped, looking away.

"I wouldn;t have wanted you to get caught up in all of this, but you being a fool, you have done anyway by saving me. What will you do now?"Yoruichi did not answer. She stood there silently thinking.

"If I know you've already come up with a plan on how to get yourself out of this, am I right?"

He stared at her then smiled. "You saw right through me as usual. Tessai, please set up a time stop about Shinji and the others, and also step to up a double- no triple barrier around the area. We're gonna make ten stealth Gigai's, two for us and eight of them. We will find a way to solve this problem, I promise. We will find a way to undo the hollowfication."

He paused. "Yoruichi, please go back to the Seireitei. The last thing I would want is for you to be exiled as well."

Kimi was finally let out of her questioning after being lectured for a good thirty minutes about her reckless actions. She had felt ashamed of herself as they told her how much danger should could have been in. They warned her never to do it again and to leave it to the real Soul reapers, even if she was training to become one herself.

But she felt even worse when she left the room into the main atrium. Sitting across from her looking anxious and nervous... were her family. She froze as she saw Yuu''s head snap up. She had had her head in her hands and her legs were shaking as though she had been leaning on a neither. Her mother and father either side of her both had an arm over her shoulders.

Yuu stared at her then got up. She walked over to her quickly. Kimi smiled as she got closer, but Yuu's face scrunched in pain. Her had came flying upwards as she landed a slap clean across Kimi left cheek with a resounding crack.

Kimi stared at the wall for a moment, what had just happened only just sinking in, along with the throbbing, tingling pain on her face. She turned her head back to Yuu whose eyes were overflowing with tears.

"How could you do that to use!" she croaked, shaking her head around. "How could you leave us like that, we were terrified!"

If the Soul Reapers lectures had made her feel guilty, it was nothing compared to now. She could bring herself to look at Yuu who was besides herself with tears. Over her shoulder Yoshino and Shinsetsu both looked close to tears themselves, but evidently holding them back.

"I'm... I'm sorry..."

"I don't care if your sorry! Sorry doesn't change the fact that you did it! You could have gotten hurt or.. or killed! Do you know how that would have made us feel? Did you not think of the consequences! Why were you so selfish!" Yuu whaled.

The Soul Reapers around them seemed to take cover in the surrounding rooms, feeling a little bit awkward. Unexpectedly Yuu suddenly swung her arms around Kimi's shoulders and pulled her into a hug.

"I really am sorry... I heard the truth about the deaths in the Rukon and thought you didnt care because you were hiding them from me.. I didn't you would care if I left or died.." she explained, her voice now cracking and tears welling up in her eyes.

"Idiot! You idiot!" Yuu held her out at arms length. "You're my little sister, you think I'd ever forgive myself if anything happened to you! I've had no one for so long and if you were suddenly to go too..." she trailed off, not wanting to think about it and crying still more violently.

Shinsetsu and Yoshino both got up and hugged the two girls, holding them tight.

"It's ok. It's over now. The whole Rukon problem is solved and everyone is safe and reunited.. that is all that matters" Shin whispered down to them. Kimi nodded, sobbing into Yuu's shoulder.

* * *

Aizen used Kimi to his advantage, that bastard! not that it changed much. Even without Kimi's evidence that outcome was the same, the judges were so set on their conviction :(

And ofc, when Kimi said you had never gained her memory back, she did! In the forest during the fight but it was locked away again soon after, so she forgot that fact that she had remember what she had forgotten! ... Ouch my brain hurts T.T

At least now,her hopes and dreams have been revived and she WILL become a Soul Reaper if it kills her!

As always sorry for any spelling or grammar mistakes, I still haven't mastered the art of catching every single one of them. I realised a while after I uploaded this that i'd forgot to readd the line breaks after copy and pasting, but theyre back now

Hope you liked :)


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